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Old 14th February 2017, 21:10   #1
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Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo discontinued

Tata Nano, Indica, Indigo to be discontinued.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/...w/57148770.cms

I had this doubt looking at the sales numbers of indica sisters over the last few months.

Unfortunately, there will be no car below Tata Tiago in their portfolio.
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Old 14th February 2017, 21:26   #2
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

Looks like Chandra is making some good moves. Hopefully he gets the right support within the Tata family.
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Old 14th February 2017, 22:56   #3
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

i won't consider this as a good move. I think all three are doing ok. In fact Nano should be taken forward and introduced with some other variants and powerful engines. Cities choked with traffic saw a lot of traction for such small cars which relatively take less parking space and easy to manoeuvre in city.
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Old 14th February 2017, 23:07   #4
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

I get the Indica/Indigo, but Nano should be continued and improved IMHO. Its finally been refined to a decent level now with the new features, utilities and comforts and AMT.
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Old 14th February 2017, 23:12   #5
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

On the face of it, many would feel that its a wrong move. Not sure about Indica, but Indigo still has got potential in cab and semi-urban/rural market. The cab market is where Indigo has some competency to get few numbers. Getting entirely out of cab market is not good step for Tata specially at a time when the cab market seems to be growing. Although weakened, the cab market was once a citadel for Tata before Dzire/Etios/Xcent dropped in.

For semi-urban and rural market, Indigo might be outclassed by Zest and other rivals, but in my view Indigo can survive. Not command the segment, but survive.

At the same time, when we look at acceptance of Tiago, Tata Motor's confidence isn't over the top. Kite sedan will need more breathing room in the market placement. And more so on the showroom floor space. Indigo and Indica are probably the oldest models in the mass market from Tata. Agreed, the UV's do predate Indica/Indigo, but that's a different segment.

Over a period of time, with Tigor/Tiago, Indica/Indigo would certainly be ignored and its best for them to have a grand farewell. This is also a good time for Tata to change its image from Cab to Private Car brand. Tiago was a breakthrough just like Indica was almost two decades ago. All the best Tata.

Last edited by aaggoswami : 14th February 2017 at 23:14.
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Old 14th February 2017, 23:20   #6
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

Quote:
Originally Posted by Highh5 View Post
In fact Nano should be taken forward and introduced with some other variants and powerful engines.
Quote:
Originally Posted by agambhandari View Post
Nano should be continued and improved IMHO.
Relax guys. Nano has become an old wine now and will get a fresh bottle soon.

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian...ased-nano.html

This is just akin to the policy followed for Vista and Aria - major facelifts were launched with re-branding as Bolt/ Zest and Hexa.
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Old 15th February 2017, 00:30   #7
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

Long overdue.

The Indica/Indigo twins should have been killed off at least 5 years ago. Nostalgia notwithstanding, Tata Motors cannot really move forward as long as it continues to be associated with these two and the reputation/baggage they carry. They had to let go.

Nano on the other hand was and still is a marvel in frugal engineering. There is a place for a car like it in the market. If they can do a Hexa and spruce up the refinement and finish and throw in some real feel-good factor, there still is potential here. I have high hopes from the Pelican.

Last edited by Shreyans_Jain : 15th February 2017 at 00:37.
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Old 15th February 2017, 00:35   #8
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

I will say its a good move by TATA. Nano was initially hyped to be a Rs 1L car but in the current scenario its priced more into the Alto 800 territory which any day is a better car overall. Indica/Indigo ruled the market for a long time. Before the market rejects them its better Tata takes them off with due respect to what these models have done. They literally created history. They misplaced the Ambassador from the Taxi market and that was not an easy job. Indica and Indigo deserves RESPECT.

Now on the flip side Nano, Indica, Indigo all has there own share of niggling problems. This will not help TATA to build up their image. Its better to stop the cars which has the 'unreliable' tag in the market, where as most of the cars on offer in the current market are ultra-reliable!

Now the Tata line up looks smart - Tiago, Bolt, Zest, Safari storm, Hexa.

All are contemporary cars with modern technology. Am giving Sumo a miss from the list as it hardly gets any private buyers now a days.

Last edited by suhaas307 : 29th January 2019 at 15:56. Reason: Minor formatting
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Old 15th February 2017, 01:14   #9
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

I still see newly registered Indica's coming on road once in a while.

If there is no car below Tiago in their portfolio, I wonder what would be the entry level 'cab' from TATA? Or perhaps all this is a part of a move to get the commercial segment away from passenger cars?

Do whatever you want TATA, do not let the ‘Tiago’ to go in cab segment .

Last edited by Hrishi_111 : 15th February 2017 at 01:16.
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Old 15th February 2017, 06:47   #10
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

Wow!! This is shocking news for me!! I just sold my Genx Nano last week and exchanged it with Alto K10!! Is this a blessing in disguise for me? The Nano was a perfect car for city use. I hope they relaunch Nano with a different name, a bigger car competing wagon r, with 1.0 litre engine atleast. Curtains down for Nano! It was truly a great Value for Money car!!
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Old 15th February 2017, 08:14   #11
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

I guess they are expecting the Bolt and Zest to take over from Indica/Indigo in the taxi segment. The lower variants, with some discounts might do exactly that.

This will be a good thing for Tata. The battered old Indica/Indigo taxis do the most damage to Tata's image. The sooner they go off the roads, the better it is for Tata.

Last edited by suhaas307 : 29th January 2019 at 15:56. Reason: Minor formatting
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Old 15th February 2017, 08:33   #12
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

(If true) I am glad that Tata has taken this step. For a while, there has been a strong need for Tata to re-invent itself.

They have set off on that journey with significantly better products in Tiago and now (hopefully) the Hexa, and the baggage of the Indica has been pulling them down.

The Indica, apart from being around far too long, is the major contributor for Tata being the "taxi specialist". Given the new-age products Tata has been considering, it needed to go.

However, I do feel that Tata can, or rather should, come with an altogether new product for the taxi market.

On the Nano front, I don't think it needed to go. But given the price it was now selling at, there are better put-together products which meant it wasn't making an impact.
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Old 15th February 2017, 09:22   #13
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

A cabbie who i was talking to recently - he had showed up in a brand new indica with only slightly more than delivery miles. He said that the tiago was available for t board purchase, but at a price similar to the indigo. At that price point it made more sense for most to get the indigo and run as uberX
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Old 15th February 2017, 09:23   #14
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

Each of the Tata products are/were well placed within the segment given features, price etc, but lose out big time on quality/reliability.

What Tata really needs is to get some engineers from JLR to train the Tata engineers and the production/QA team to be revamped to become world class.
An Indigo which can run as reliably as Toyota Etios will sell as much as an Etios too.

In essence Tata needs to make over its car division like Harley Davidson did with their bikes.

While the is just positioned wrongly as an alternative to Alto. It needs to be an alternative to 2 wheelers.
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Old 15th February 2017, 10:23   #15
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re: Rumour: Tata Nano, Indica & Indigo to be discontinued

Finally, Tata does what Toyota had earlier done with the Qualis and later repeated it with the Innova. And Maruti did with the Dzire. For a company doing not so well in the market, it is a tough decision to cut down the little source of revenue it is getting from old/outtdated product lineup. Probably this is why they were flogging the war horse even after the horse was old and tired. Now as a part of the long term strategy, they have to lose some to win some.

While I agree with most of you that Nano was a piece of engineering marvel (with a few chinks in the armour too), the normal crowd never accepted the car. Even yesterday, I had a real tough time convincing my friend that a Nano is very spacious inside and a wonderful city car. The general perception has been that its small, cramped, unsafe and not a "real" car.

This brings up a question in my mind. A company might have invested 'x' amount in developing a product and would be looking at 'y' amount to recover from it, over a period of time. For a company like Toyota, they must have phased out the Qualis/Innova after (or long after) the recovery was done. But what about the Etios twins? They are not successful and selling in meagre numbers and yet, Toyota is holding on to them. Is it waiting for recovery rather than writing off the investment? For Maruti, we have models such as Omni which need to be replaced with better engineered products. I can't see any dragging product in the current Hyundai lineup, mostly because all were successful and would have given sufficient returns.

Tata must have recovered their investment in Indica twins long back but were trying to milk the cow as long as possible. They could have stopped had the Vista/Manza been huge success but alas, that was not the case. Nano was dragging too long but couldn't have made any recovery at the current success rate. So they must have decided to plug the black hole (money goes in and doesn't come out).

PS: I have taken a few models as examples only and not trying to pin-point any particular manufacturer or product model.

Last edited by suhaas307 : 29th January 2019 at 15:59. Reason: Adding PS / minor formatting
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