Team-BHP - Audi Q5 to be assembled in India from March

I came across this article on ibnlive.com which talks about the Q5 being assembled in the Aurangabad plant from next March. I have pasted the whole article below. How much will be the price difference once this happens?

German luxury car manufacturer Audi AG on Thursday said it would start assembling its Sports Utility Vehicle (SUV) Q5 at its Aurangabad plant in Maharashtra from next March."We will start local assembling of our SUV Q5 at the Aurangabad plant. This year we are expecting to sell 200 units, while it should go up to 500 units from next year," said Audi India Managing Director Benoit Tiers.
The Indian subsidiary of Audi would start a new line of production for the SUV with an initial capacity of 500 units per year, Tiers said.
"India is the second country after Germany where the Q5 will be assembled," he added.
Audi currently assembles its luxury sedans A4 and A6 at the Aurangabad plant.
The models are imported to India in a completely knocked down version to avoid the 116 per cent duty slapped on completely built units. Knocked down units attract only 60 per cent duty.
Audi plans to invest about €30 million in the country till 2015, and the new production line would be part of this investment, Tiers said.
The company last year sold 1,050 units and has set a target to cross 1,500 units this year.
"We have already sold 1,128 units this year. If everything goes well, I hope and we have a good chance to sell 1,700 to 1,800 cars in 2009, which will be an increase of about 70 per cent," Tiers said.

Judging by industry standards, I don't think there will be any price reduction. All the mercs c, e and s are made here but are still priced the same as any import. It just means the company will be making more money saving on import duties. The pricing strategy these guys follow is to just keep it marginally cheaper than what it would cost someone to import the car on their own from abroad.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sahil (Post 1466243)

Not a chance ! 1.5L is more likely, India is a profit haven for these luxury car makers :Frustrati

Not even that :(

Source

“We already assemble the A4 and the A6 and we are thinking of assembling an SUV. There will be no change in the price since every product is launched already priced at the CKD (local assembly) price. We do not differentiate between CBU and CKD prices,” said Martin Birkner

Quote:

Originally Posted by RakishRam (Post 1476952)

“We already assemble the A4 and the A6 and we are thinking of assembling an SUV. There will be no change in the price since every product is launched already priced at the CKD (local assembly) price. We do not differentiate between CBU and CKD prices,” said Martin Birkner

When compared with UK price we buy A4 with 10L premium and Q5 with 20L premium though A4 and Q5 are priced similar in UK :deadhorse.

How can they claim that they do not differentiate between CBU and CKD prices? Is 105% an insignificant amount?

Its ok for launch, but on a sustained basis?

BMW did that when they launched in India, they sold the 3 and the 5 imported as CBU`s at the same price that they wanted to sell their locally assembled units. But that was only till their chennai factory came online, not forever!

Quote:

Originally Posted by evo (Post 1477080)

How can they claim that they do not differentiate between CBU and CKD prices? Is 105% an insignificant amount?

Well that's another way to tell that Audi would like to retain all the fat profits going from CBU to CKD route. Starved as we are of all the goodies - (20L Fortuner/Endy getting overbooked in non-time etc.) it all makes a good business sense. Milk as much as you can while the good things last. There could be price revisions etc in the future when competition heats up and early adopters demand has been whetted - but again no one has seen the future. We live in present.

Good thing about our country is that we have billion plus people and a huge untapped demand/appetite for these goodies exist. It will be a while before things start going to a logical level.

Sorry enough of my rants :D and going OT at places.

Heck, that is the most unconvicing explanation yet by another foreign op out to suck us dry :Frustrati
Don't they care about volumes???

Quote:

Originally Posted by RakishRam (Post 1476952)