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09 November, 2011 South Korean car maker Hyundai has lined up 10-15 launches in India in the next four to five years, in an attempt to protect and boost its market share that is under pressure due to increasing competition.
The firm, whose market share in India has fallen to 18.3 percent from 21 percent in the past 12-18 months, plans to overhaul its portfolio with stylish so-called “fluidic” designs and enter categories where it has no presence.
“The excitement in the market is derived out of only new models and the facelifts, so you have to be continuously working towards it,” said Arvind Saxena, vice-president sales and marketing, Hyundai India. The company plans to launch a cost-saving LPG variant of Eon prompted by rising petrol prices.
Also on cards from Hyundai stable are an executive sedan positioned above Verna to take on likes of Chevrolet Cruze and Honda Civic, in addition to variants and facelifts of i10 and i20 in the next few years. Hyundai recently launched its smallest car Eon, pitted against Maruti’s global top seller Alto.
Hyundai’s planned product onslaught comes at a time India’s largest car maker Maruti Suzuki has lined up 15-20 cars by 2015. Foreign car markers have also planned a parade of new cars, including 6-8 from General Motors, eight from Ford, and 10-15 from Renault-Nissan.
Backed by the strong economic growth and low penetration of cars, the passenger car market in India has witnessed a strong double digit growth over the last few years and it is expected to maintain a growth of 12-14 percent in the next five years.
However in the first six month of this fiscal, passenger vehicle sales have remained sluggish, growing at 1.84 percent as rising interest rates, firmer commodity prices and stubbornly high inflation dented demand in one of the fastest growing car markets.
“Experts said it is not surprising to see a barrage of new launches as product lifecycles get shorter and competition intensifies.” The basic genesis has to be that it has to offer value and it has to be differentiated from other products.
With Eon at the bottom end and Santa Fe at the top, Hyundai will study all segments within this range that could make sense for the Indian market, Saxena said. With widening price differential between diesel and petrol, Hyundai has not ruled out compact diesel cars in future.

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29 September, 2011 French carmaker Renault has lined up a marketing spend of Rs 6.5 crore during the F1 Grand Prix, scheduled to be held in Greater Noida near Delhi from October 28.
“We have a lot of events around the F1 GP. Apart from the engines on the cars, we will display an F1 car, hold events at malls using race simulators so that winners get invites to the GP,” said Len Curran, vice-president, sales and marketing, Renault India. He added that the company had prepared campaigns with Yahoo and animation at its showrooms, where tickets can be won. The company’s chairman, Carlos Ghosn, will unveil during the event the concept version of its hatchback that it plans to launch in the country in the first quarter of 2012.
Curran was in Pune for the unveiling of the Koleos sports utility vehicle. Customers could soon face a waiting list for the Koleos, he said, should the orders continue at the same rate in October as in the first month of the vehicle's launch.
Renault, which has announced a five-car roll out by December 2012, will bring in the mini SUV, the Duster, by the first half of next year. “This will be a heavily Indianised car, not like the Dacia Duster that you see in Europe,” Curran said.
The firm has sold 700 units of the luxury sedan Fluence since its launch in May, with the diesel variant accounting for 80 percent of sales. Meanwhile, Renault has begun sales in Europe of its Twizzy, a coupe which has largely been designed at its Mumbai engineering design centre.

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