Born largely out of the need to replace the aging Simca 1100, the Horizon was essentially a shortened version of the larger Alpine, giving the vehicle an unusually wide track for its length. The Horizon, or "Project C2" as it was known inside Simca during development, was intended to be a "world car" (designed for consumers on both sides of the Atlantic), but, in execution, the European and North American versions of the vehicle actually turned out to have very little in common.