Skoda Yeti to get facelift soon

     Skoda Auto will give a mild facelift to its premium SUV Yeti soon. The facelift will include reworked front end in the exterior and upholstery change in the interior. With sales being poor, Skoda recently launched a budget edition 4x2 Yeti. However there is no news of a 7 seater Yeti yet.

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News of Excise Duty hike on diesel cars resurfaces again

     The news of hiking the Excise Duty on diesel cars has surfaced again after a steep hike of over Rs. 5 on petrol. The finance ministry is looking at the issue after the petroleum ministry insisted on the hike to discourse people from using highly subsidised diesel. The oil ministry suggests that the additional amount collected from the excise hike can be utilised to compensate the loss that fuel retailers suffer on the sale of diesel at government controlled rates.

     The huge gap between petrol (Rs. 80/liter) and diesel (Rs. 45/liter) is prompting people to go for diesel cars. In fact last month the sales of Swift (80% of which sold are diesel) surpassed the Alto (which is a petrol vehicle) inspite of the former’s price being double that of the later.

     The Govt. is providing subsidy of Rs. 15.35 per liter on the diesel. Diesel in our country is perceived mainly as a fuel for mass transportation (goods & people) and agriculture. Any increase in diesel prices will automatically raise the already raised inflation. There has been argument for a long time that, rich should not get subsidised fuel and the subsidised fuel should only be available to poor people (aam admi). But the fact is that, the main loss to the Government is the multiple levels of taxes state government charges on the fuel.

     If the excise duty hike does take place for diesel cars, the India growth story in the Automobile segment will be hit significantly.

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Top twenty car sales in May 2012 in India

1. Maruti Alto – 20,724

2. Maruti Swift – 20,050

3. Maruti Dzire – 17,707

4. Mahindra Bolero – 9,584

5. Tata Nano – 8,507

6. Hyundai i20 – 7,675

7. Maruti Omni – 7,452

8. Hyundai Eon – 7,346

9. Maruti WagonR – 7,101

10. Hyundai i10 – 6,959

11. Maruti Ertiga – 6,802

12. Toyota Innova – 6,710

13. Indica+Vista – 5,467

14. Hyundai Verna – 5,403

15. Ford Figo – 4,726

16. Honda Brio – 4,512

17. Toyota Etios – 4,270

18. Mahindra Scorpio – 4,269

19. Hyundai Santro – 4,192

20. Chevrolet Beat – 4,104 

Source: team-bhp

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All new Hyundai Elantra coming soon to India

     Hyundai will soon launch the new generation Elantra in India. The new Elantra which is the third product from Hyundai on the fluidic-sculpture design was recently spied testing in South India.

     The new Elantra reflects Hyundai’s fluidic sculpture design and we feel it is the best fluidic sculpture design from the Hyundai stable. The dimensions of the car has given designers more room for stretching creases which was difficult in Fluidic Verna and Eon because of their smaller size. The interiors of the car are equally attractive and the striking feature is the multimedia screen which dominates the whole dashboard. 


     The new Elantra will be powered by a 147 Bhp, 1.8 liter petrol and 1.8 liter diesel engines. The new Elantra will compete against Skoda Laura, Volkswagen Jetta, Renault Fluence, Chevrolet Cruze and Toyota Corolla in India.

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Tata Motors Blaze De Rajasthan 2012 starts on 9th June 2012

     Tata Motors motorsports division ‘Tata Motors Full Throttle’ has launched an off-road rally competition for all rally enthusiast called ‘TATA MOTORS BLAZE DE RAJASTHAN’ happening on 9th and 10th of June 2012. The rally starts and ends in Jaipur covering adventurous terrain stretch of 300 Km. 

     The rally has three categories – 2WD, 4WD and Women’s team. The competition is open to all the rally enthusiasts and any make of the vehicle. The rally stretch encompass in-city drives, hilly tarmac sections, sandy trails, specially made tracks to test the navigation skills of the participants. Thar Motorsports is the program partner for planning and execution of this event and Tata Motors will take care of all logistical, medical and service support. 

Mr. Jatin Lakra, Head Marketing-Sumo and Grande, Tata Motors said,”After a series of successes in rallies, Tata Motors Full Throttle brings the joy of competitive rallying to all motorsports enthusiast across the country. Rajasthan is a popular destination for off-roading and a natural choice for us to hold our first one-day off-roading rally. The state has some of the most extensive networks of roads that connect even small towns and villages and are fairly isolated with little traffic load, ideal for such sporting events.”

     Tata Motors Full Throttle recently launched two off-roading events for the owners of Tata Motors SUVs called Tata Motors Full Throttle Experience and Tata Motors Full Throttle Trails. The Full Thorttle Experience will be flagged off from New Delhi on June 22 and goes on for number of days. The Full Throttle Trails are half day offroading events with total of 21 trails. 

To take part in these adventurous rallying activities email to Tata Motors at -

blazederajasthan@tatamotorsfullthrottle.com 
or
experiences@tatamotorsfullthrottle.com

You can visit http://www.tatamotorsfullthrottle.com for more details.

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Husqvarna Motorcycles to come to India

     Husqvarna Motorcycles, the name seems to be very new in India. But Husqvarna Motorcyles has a very strong history dating back to 1903. Husqvarna was established in 1903 in Sweden and made bicycles before starting making motorcycles. In 1987 Husqvarna became a part of MV Agusta and currently is owned by BMW Motorrad. Husqvarna is headquartered at Varese, Italy.

     Husqvarna makes a range of motorcycles for Off-road, Supermotor and Street use. The company aims to bring Husqvarna Nuda 900R as its first offering for India. The other bikes from Husqvarna are less than 800cc and need homologation before bringing it to India. The Nuda 900R is powered by a 900cc engine sourced from the BMWF800R parallel twin motor. The capacity of the engine has been increased to 900cc and Husqvarna has tuned the engine to their requirements. The engine produces 105 Ps of power and 100 Nm of torque and weighs 175 Kgm. The Husqvarna Nuda 900R is expected to be priced at Rs. 14 lakh in India.

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Honda aims big for India, hopes to sell 1 million cars by 2015-16

     Honda has never been so serious in Indian markets. The tragedies in Japan and Thailand prompted the Japanese motorcycle to car manufacturer ‘Honda Motor Corporation’ to focus more on the developing markets to break even volumes and thus profits.

     Honda first entered India in 1998 with a sole mode ‘City’ sedan. The City since then almost ruled the segment in spite of being priced high, just because of the sheer pleasure it give to its customers. In fact the ‘City’ lost its dominance recently to the new entrants Volkswagen Vento and Hyundai Verna. It was not due to the better quality and value for money of the new enterants, but just for the lack of a diesel option.

     Honda has developed a 1.6 L diesel (i-DTEC) which will power the ‘City’ sedan and hopefully the Civic as well. Though the engine and its technology is the first from Honda in the segment, the strong heritage of quality products of Honda assures us to have a wonderful diesel engine which could surpass its competitors in most of the parameters. A smaller 1.2 L diesel is also under development to propel Jazz and Brio to be launched early next year. The diesel Brio has already been spied testing in Noida, which means the Brio diesel will come sooner than expected.

     With range of diesel vehicles in the Honda’s portfolio, the company aims to sell over 1 million units in India by the next 4 to 5 years. To attain this Honda has to sell over a lakh of vehicles per year which is possible only when it prices its vehicles cheaper than its competitors. Also Honda has to bring more range of cars in different segments to get the volumes going. The launch of Brio petrol with a price tag of Rs. 3.95 lakh (ex-showroom, New Delhi) and re pricing of Jazz petrol is a classical example which has made Honda to rethink about its strategies in India.

     We at AutomobilePlanet.com have faith that Honda has all the capabilities to be another Suzuki Motor Company in India. With Honda’s brilliant technology, futuristic design, strong quality maintenance, environmental awareness and the zeel to make a better automobile, we Indians will have a wonderful time motoring in the coming days. We would also like to see Honda Freed, Honda Concept S and Honda Odyssey plying on our roads. 

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