Report: P.Tharyan & Rahul Kapoor Photography: Rahul Kapoor
One thing that India’s leading car maker Maruti Suzuki has in common with India’s leading car exporter Hyundai Motor India is that both sell small and affordable cars in India. Now that Maruti Suzuki has put together a team that goes by the name NEXA to sell its premium cars, Hyundai, according to highly placed sources, is contemplating when to introduce its luxury cars in India. And there lies a big difference between these two companies.
Maruti Suzuki’s NEXA outlets will only sell premium cars beginning with the S Cross crossover vehicle that will be launched in the country in the next couple of months. In order to keep their newly set up NEXA outlets warm and busy, they will, for the time being, sell the Ciaz premium sedan. Once the S-Cross is launched, sale of Ciaz models will be discontinued at these NEXA dealerships and pushed into the ordinary Maruti Suzuki dealerships. But what is a lot more interesting is when Hyundai would bring in its luxury cars into India. Unconfirmed sources say that the company is pouring over several strategies to introduce these cars into India but has not yet decided on any one strategy.
Hyundai Motor India is contemplating bringing their flagship saloons the Genesis and Continental / Equus to India. The unfortunate scenario for Suzuki in that case will be that if Hyundai is to bring in the cavalry (all costing upwards of Rs 35-40 lakh), the biggest vehicle Suzuki has to offer is the Kizashi and others like the Grand Vitara, pushing a little further, the APV people carrier MPV (sub Rs 20 lakh vehicles) . There is nothing in the Suzuki stable to match that segment while Toyota, Honda and Hyundai all do.
Hyundai’s luxury cars are value for money products in the North American markets. Both in terms of engine refinement and luxury trappings, these Hyundai luxury cars stand out even when compared to the blue blooded models from companies like BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi. Hyundai, it is reliably learnt, is keen to push these marques in India and be one up on its closest rival Maruti Suzuki. While Hyundai has yet to decide on a channel to sell its expensive cars in India, Maruti Suzuki plans a NEXA launch across the country.
What does NEXA ultimately mean? Well if you think it’s like what Lexus is to Toyota, or Infinity is to Nissan, or Acura is to Honda, we are sad to break this to you, but unfortunately it’s not true. The Lexus, Infinity and Acura brands are luxury brands, Here we are talking about sales channels and the NEXA is on the lines of Toyota’s sales channels in Japan like “Toyota,” “Toyopet,” “Corolla” and “Netz.”
For the complete report pick up the June 2015 issue of Motown India
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