Maruti Suzukis replacement for the Maruti 800

Right from the onset ,Tata have made it quite clear that they plan to take on the Maruti 800.So whether it was internal space or mileage it was the Maruti 800 which was on the radar.Even efore the Nano has actually hit the roads the 800 sales are dwindling so it would have been impossible for it to compete with the Nano.

So maruti now are talking about a replacement for the Maruti 800 which would be more oriented towards design,features and quality than actually using price as its USP.According o Sify this new car is code named "YR9" and has a tall boy design[increasing interior space].It is being speculated that this car would have a 660cc engine and Maruti engineers are attempting to better the 20kmpl figure of the Tata Nano.This car would be more expensive than the Nano but may just be a bit cheaper than the present 800 although pricing details not yet known.

Now if you ask me what I think of this strategy,I say brilliant.It is getting too crowded at the bottom of the car buyers pyramid in India and really volume expectations from the manufacturers for this segment is a bit too unrealistic.They are assuming that all of India is going to buy from the A segment of cars.So we will have Tata,Maruti,Bajaj-Renault,Possibly GM with a chinese tie-up but is there actually such a huge market in this segment.Moreover this segment means customers may associate the manufacturer with the mass market tag and not like to associate themselves with the higher end cars from the same manufacturer.Volumes are good but in the end its the Margins that matter after all why did VW move from the People's car manufacturer tag to now a literally Luxury car manufacturer.