[Seran Manian]

Thanks for the October 2014 sales figure updates. Is some thing going against Honda?

Sales down by 1800 in September as well as October.
Mobilio Sales heavily down as against Ertiga.
But for Brio all other models have been sold less than previous month.
Is Ciaz going to cut in to City's figures? The coming months will tell.

[vipinendran]

Originally Posted by The Alchemist

Maruti & Hyundai continue to rule the Indian car market. It is sad to see that Ford Fiesta numbers are not improving

What are the alternative options we have instead of alto? Scooters/Motor bikes? Auto rickshaws? public transport?

Do you think any of the options mentioned above are better than 'alto'. The recent discussion about CAR safety in this forum is conveniently ignoring the ROAD safety requirement of a common man. India is a country with one of the lowest number of vehicles per capita (41 cars per 1000 - ranks at 129 internationally). Which means, majority of the population is relying on bikes, auto rickshaws, taxis, public transport etc for their daily commutes.

As you mentioned, more than 60% of car sales come from A, B1, B2 segments. Even in B1, B2 segments the lower end variants constitutes the major share. Cost is a major concern for us Indians.

When I decided to buy a car about 2 years ago, safety was an important concern for me, which meant I needed more money. Result? - The purchase was delayed by one more year. Was I any safer on my bike over that one year period?

So, no, we can not just root for banning alto and the likes. What we need is a choice for end customer to make an informed purchase. India should device a safety testing program, and all variants of all cars should carry the safety rating on the wind-shield. This should be mandated by law.

This will in turn force all car makers to build safer cars

Apologies for the off-topic discussion!

I never mentioned anywhere in my post that autos/two wheelers are better than the alto. What I said was the sad state of our Indian car market where neither the Govt. nor we people are taking responsibility for the safety of the cars with the result that the manufacturer is not bothered as long as the car sells an we Indians buy it taking the price as the only important factor. Just imagine spending your hard earned money on a tin box which becomes a moving coffin. It happened to a dear friend of mine. So let us demand safety and not get into the "It won't happen to me" syndrome. Accidents can happen to anyone at anytime

[D4D]

• Where has Honda got it wrong with the Amaze and the Brio? Both don't seem to be selling too well. And why a sudden drop for Mobilio?
• If not Innova, Toyota would have been somewhere at the bottom. What's wrong in getting the Vios and Yaris in?
• Nice to see Zest getting some good numbers. Hope Tata motors grow well. This is their make-or-break period in the car industry.
• Hyundai seems to be making the right moves. Grand i10, Elite i20 have brought good volumes. Hope the facelifted Verna can do the same. And the ix25 is waiting. Do they have a mini MPV for India?
• Can Maruti ever make a wrong move? I don't think so. Alto K10 AMT is going to kill the competition. Too early to judge the Ciaz.

[turbospooler]

I don't understand why is the technically advanced Passat not selling when it's Czech counterpart is flying!

Sonata should also start performing as petrol prices are competing with diesel now but the manufacturer isn't interested to sell in its bid to increase volume sales.

[zenren]

Originally Posted by turbospooler

I don't understand why is the technically advanced Passat not selling when it's Czech counterpart is flying!

I thought VW discontinued Passat here.

Originally Posted by ajmat

Lets looks at sales from a platform perspective

Maruti - purely on the Swift derivatives - Ertiga, Swift, Ritz, D'zire sells 38000 units.
Hyundai - Eon till i20 sell 32000 units

This means economies of scale leads to competitive pricing that leads to good profit and also happy dealers

Swift platform is usually at the 43k mark; this month is more of an anomaly due to facelifted Swift launch and some associated delays bringing down Swift numbers. However, I don't think Ritz is based on the Swift platform.

In case of Hyundai, is there any part sharing between Eon and i20; or even Grand i10?

[turbospooler]

Originally Posted by zenren

I thought VW discontinued Passat here.

Hi zenren!
I did some checking but all I found out was they are still keen on selling the vehicle here but is now ordered on demand, I guess.

http://profit.ndtv.com/news/industri...n-india-375934

I can't understand what is the point of localising production of these low volume cars. This was a primary reason why Honda pulled out Civic & Accord out of India as there was not enough demand to make them here or import without increasing the price significantly.

[zenren]

Originally Posted by turbospooler

Hi zenren!
I did some checking but all I found out was they are still keen on selling the vehicle here but is now ordered on demand, I guess.

http://profit.ndtv.com/news/industri...n-india-375934

Irrespective of what they mentioned to the press, they've removed Passat from their models list in VW India official site.

http://www.volkswagen.co.in/en/models.html

EDIT:
That NDTV Profit news was close to a year back.

[DicKy]

[quote=drmohitg;3574547]Absolutely amazing performance by the new Corolla. 1000+ units shipped. That is more than double the units shipped after putting all the rest of the cars in the segment together.

/QUOTE]

And can't still see the teambhp official review

On the other hand good to see Zest making good numbers.

[motorworks]

What is surprising is that the swift duos -Dzire and the hatch continue to sell as good as ever. Competition has hardly had any effect! The Amaze, Xcent and the zest in total are unable to match the dzire's numbers. I'm really surprised since these cars are from Hyundai and Honda and the perception of these brands are better than that of Maruti!

[tbppjpr]

Originally Posted by turbospooler

I did some checking but all I found out was they are still keen on selling the vehicle here but is now ordered on demand, I guess.

http://profit.ndtv.com/news/industri...n-india-375934

Please check the date of publishing in the link, its Dec, 2013. They have indeed discontinued Passat long ago. And few days ago there was a news that they discontinued Touareg also.

If VW wants to stay here for long then they should seriously consider shaking hands with some Chinese or Korean manufacturer and bring some built to cost vehicles here which can sell in big numbers and help them earning big margins. Making sturdy and solid cars built on their latest international platforms, paying for constant R&D, introducing variety of fun to drive engines and high-tech gearboxes not gonna pay them in this country.

Originally Posted by zenren

The only question is about Mahindra. Where are they testing their cars, if they are doing it?

They have been desperate to sell their vehicles in America since long time, though no idea if they have succeeded or not.

Here are couple of crash tests of Scorpio pickup:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLmjVO3mRxE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICWgcCPz81o

One thing noticeable here is that they had tweaked structure of their 2012 testing vehicle in such a manner that it performed better than the 2011 model.

[vsrivatsa]

Originally Posted by vjjustin

In Maruti's defence,
1) Even City has a huge backlog due to the production being stopped for couple of months and other production issues. So, even these numbers could be the backlogs clearing out; might need to wait to see the real impact of CIAZ.
2) When City came in, the only real competition was the relatively old, boat like Verna. For CIAZ, the competition is the relatively new, all praised, champ of the segment, the City. That might be one of the reasons for the difference in initial numbers. I am not sure City will continue to do the 7000-9000 numbers now with CIAZ in the picture.
3) Presumambly, CIAZ also has vendor issues in production of some critical component and we do not know the impact/constraint in production yet. The two top end models - Z(O) and Z+ - and the automatic versions are not yet available in the market and in many places, even the test drive is not yet (or just) started. I guess, the numbers will increase in the next months.

The fact of the matter seems to be Honda is having Production Issues and now they seem to have it sorted out and they would be going full steam with production of 10,000 Units of City per Month. So, the numbers from next month will tell the true tale: Honda City waiting time to come down

[turbospooler]

Originally Posted by zenren

Irrespective of what they mentioned to the press, they've removed Passat from their models list in VW India official site.

http://www.volkswagen.co.in/en/models.html

EDIT:
That NDTV Profit news was close to a year back.

Originally Posted by tbppjpr

Please check the date of publishing in the link, its Dec, 2013. They have indeed discontinued Passat long ago. And few days ago there was a news that they discontinued Touareg also.

If VW wants to stay here for long then they should seriously consider shaking hands with some Chinese or Korean manufacturer and bring some built to cost vehicles here which can sell in big numbers and help them earning big margins. Making sturdy and solid cars built on their latest international platforms, paying for constant R&D, introducing variety of fun to drive engines and high-tech gearboxes not gonna pay them in this country.


They have been desperate to sell their vehicles in America since long time, though no idea if they have succeeded or not.

I was well aware of the date of the news. The only problem was that there was no news item which concretely pointed out that Passat has been withdrawn from India.
Also, I guess the VW website may have taken off the old Passat as the 2015 model is slated for launch here in coming months.

All in all, I guess VW is only enjoying volumes in China and LatAm. Utter desperation in US and neglect in other markets will come in it's vision to become No. 1 with their MQB platform.

[Sebring]

Imagine if the Omni came with factory fitted AC! Sales would go through the roof for such a value proposition.

Omni + Eeco ~10000

Most of the Omnis I have seen are not used for commuting. It is used by farmers & small scale businesses to transport luggage. So we can say that Omni is the cheap & fuel efficient cargo carrier for the common man. Safety of the driver is a concern though, but hopefully the buyers already know that.

[tbppjpr]

Originally Posted by Sebring

Most of the Omnis I have seen are not used for commuting. It is used by farmers & small scale businesses to transport luggage. So we can say that Omni is the cheap & fuel efficient cargo carrier for the common man. Safety of the driver is a concern though, but hopefully the buyers already know that.

Unfortunately thats not true, our kids are being transported from home-to-school-to-home in the super unsafe tin can built vehicles like Omni, Eeco, Tata ACE, Autorikhwas and similar vehicles. Atleast this is what I regularly see. Ironically the drivers of these vehicle don't give a damn on occupant's safety or traffic laws.

[auto-one]

Thank you Aditya, for sharing the data.
IMO Following are the reasons for the Beat not doing well:-
1. The facelift does not offer any thing substantial to maintain / increase the customer's interest in the car. (Same with the Figo). Wasted opportunity by Chevrolet.
2. No AMT offered
3. Somehow Chevy seems to have lost the initial enthusiasm it had with the Beat.The company seems to be reacting ( or rather not?) too slow to the changing preferences of the Indian customers and seems to be going directionless.
4. The Beat, except for the futuristic design, which again, some may not like, has no concrete USP.

I personally would like the Beat to be get more equipment and improvements in certain areas to do better .