Global carmakers looking to make their foray into the booming Indian car market and are intending to imitate Maruti Suzuki’s strategy for launching a hatchback and sedan variants of the same model, as they find ways to cut costs.

Maruti Dzire, the highest selling sedan in the country, owes its origin to another best-seller, the Swift hatchback. Companies like the world’s largest carmaker Toyota, Europe’s largest car maker Volkswagen, Japan’s Honda and America’s Ford Motor plan to use the same technology to make both hatchbacks and sedans for their future launches in India.

Toyota however will use its small car platform, Yaris, to launch a small and a big car in India next year. Volkswagen’s small car Polo as well as Ford’s new small car will have additional sedan variants.

Dzire is priced at Rs 4.6 lakh- 6.7 lakh (diesel and petrol) and sold 60,000 units in the last fiscal. Some of its variants have a delivery lag of over two month owing to the high bookings.

Talking about making a successful foray in India, Toyota Kirloskar Motor’s deputy MD for marketing, Sundeep Singh says that the company hopes to achieve its sales target in the country with the twin hatchback-sedan strategy. He adds “We have already begun ground work for the small car. While the premium hatchback is for customers upgrading from entry-level cars, the sedan will target customers wanting a bigger car”.

After launching Passat and Jetta sedans in India, Volkswagen will add a third sedan based on the Polo platform. Its main model under the same brand will be a hatchback. “India will be the only market where both versions of the Polo will be made available. Both cars will be positioned in a way to avoid competing with Skoda Fabia,” said Jorg Muller, Volkswagen India president and managing director. The hatchback will be launched later this year and the sedan version will follow after few months.

Auto analysts that keep tab of the Indian market said, as competition intensifies in India, manufacturers will find ways to cut costs and multi-product platforms will be used to remain competitive. “Dzire is just the beginning and we will see many more companies rolling out two or more cars from a single platform,” says Mohit Arora, senior director, JD Power Asia Pacific. Honda Siel Cars India has gone a step ahead by launching two different cars from a single platform. It`s yet to be launched premium small car, Jazz, will be based on the Honda City platform.

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Posted by Amrith K.A on 13 May, 2009 5:54:41 PM IST #