The Maruti Suzuki India group has launched the A-Star in India which is produced in Haryana at teh Manesar factory. The car has been desgined by Rajesh Kumar and Saurabh Singh.
The car is a Euro 5-compliant model with lower Co2 emissions. The car is going to be the replacement for the Alto in export markets. In India the car will be a direct competition to the Hyundai i10.
The price of the Maruti A-Star is a good 10% higher than the i10. The base version of the A-star will be about 3.6lacs.
Maruti November 19th 2008
The TATA Indica Vista is all set to be rolled out soon. This is the word the dealers have received but there is nothing official on this piece of news.
The new Indica Vista will be available with a 1.2litre petrol engine which is called - Safire. The CRDi version will be called the Quadrajet and is a 1.3 litre engine. There is another variant to this car which is TATA’s own 1.4 litre turbo diesel engine.
The Quadrajet engine is the one manufactured by Maruti Suzuki and is currently used in the Swift and DZire models.
The word we hear from the TATA camp is that no old models will be discontinued for this, and all of them will co-exist with the new Indica Vista.
The Fiat 500 - the much fancied car of 2008 has been launched in India. The two door Fiat new car is to be priced around 15lac ex-showroom Mumbai. The on-road price in India (Mumbai) will be close to 17lac.
This car will not be fancied by the public, but is going to be loved by the rich youth of the country. Celebrities and car lovers would enjoy this car as much as anything.
The Fiat 500 will face stiff competition against the Mini Cooper and the Volkswagen Beetle which is also going to be launched soon in India.
General motors has made it public that they are looking at negotiations seriously with Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. regarding launching the Hummer in India with full fledged availability.
GM had admitted to this in Thailand at the plant opening for production of new cars. There have also been talks of GM selling their Hummer division to the Indian company but that idea seems to be far fetched for the moment. Although there are several automakers in Russia and also China who could be interested in such a deal.
The company has been reporting its worse numbers in their corporate history and is looking to raise capital with the sale of its assets.
Honda Siel, the Indian division has launched the new model for the Civic to keep up with the demand of the ‘Young Indian’. The car is a spin off variant of the Honda Civic and is a limited edition sports car.
The Special edition was launched just as Honda reached the 3 lakh mark in auto car sales in India.
The Honda Civic Sport will come with a 1.8Litre i-Vtec engine and will come with manual transmission. Automatic transmission will not be provided from the company itself. The car was also the highlight of the Auto Expo in Delhi which took place early this year.
“This launch will help broaden our customer base and appeal to the young at heart target audience.” said Mr Masahiro Takedagawa, President & CEO of Honda Siel Cars India Ltd.
