Hyundai too raising car prices as input costs mount

HYUNDAI Motor India Ltd ( HMIL), the Indian arm of the Korean automobile maker, on Wednesday said it would raise the prices of its products by up to two per cent from the first week of June.



“There has been an increase in the input costs and we have been absorbing it for a while. The situation now is such that we have to pass some parts of it to the consumers,” Hyundai Motor India Ltd senior vice president marketing and sales Arvind Saxena said. He said the company will hike the prices of its various models by up to two per cent. “The price increase will come into effect from the first week of June,” he added.

Hyundai currently sells hatchback models Santro, i10, Getz along with sedans Accent, Verna, Sonata Embera in the country. The companys move to hike prices follows rival Maruti Suzuki India Ltd ( MSIL), which last week hiked prices across various models by between Rs 1,000 and Rs 18,000.

Maruti had hiked the prices of all its petrol variants — the hatchback Swift, sedan SX4 and the Gypsy — by Rs 9,000, while the price of the diesel version of Swift was raised by Rs 15,000. It had also increased the price of all variants of Zen Estilo and WagonR LPG by Rs 1,000 and of Alto and M800 by Rs 1,500.

Prices of all variants of Omni and WagonR Petrol were hiked by Rs 2,000 and that of multi- utility vehicle (MUV) Versa by Rs 8,000. Earlier, in January, Hyundai Motor India had raised the prices of all its models by between two to three per cent.

Koito readies new lights for Nano

KOITO Manufacturing Co, the maker of head lamps for Lexus brand cars, is designing lights specifically for ultra- low cost cars as it tries to win more business from Tata Motors Ltd and Nissan Motor Co.

“Koito, the worlds' biggest maker of headlamps, is in the final stages of creating a simpler light that uses half as many parts as its more expensive models,” said the company's president Masahiro Ohtake on Thursday.

Koito and other auto parts makers are reengineering products for use in cars that cost almost half as much as Suzuki Motor Corps Maruti 800, the cheapest car currently on the Indian market. Tata will sell its $2,500 Nano later this year.

Nissan plans to produce a car with the same price by 2011 for India and other emerging markets. “Koito has no choice but to push into this low- cost market as all the carmakers get into the business,” said Kunihiro Matsumoto, a senior analyst at UBS Securities Japan Ltd in Tokyo. Costs wont bump up with Koito using existing technology and cheaper labour.

The parts maker opened a second Indian plant in September in Haryana to be closer to factories of automakers including Maruti Suzuki India, Ohtake said. The company now supplies lights for Tata's trucks. “A low- cost car requires ahead lamp design all its own,” Ohtake said.

Cars at about $3,000 are something that is being talked about on a global level and will become a big business. Koito is 20 per cent owned by Toyota Motor Corp. Tata unveiled the Nano in January and will begin selling the model later this year. The firm may export the car after three years, Ratan Tata, the Tata's chairman, said in January.

Nissan, France's Renault SA and India’s Bajaj Auto said on May 12 that they would build a$2,500 car in India to go on sale in 2011.

Toyota also plans to build a new low cost small car in India in 2010. Toyota's new factory will be near Bangalore. Koito already supplies headlamps to Toyota from its facility in Chennai. Koitos Indian operations are in joint venture Lucas TVS.

India’s passenger car sales, which doubled in the past five years, are set to triple to three million vehicles annually by 2015, according to the Indian government. Global sales of small cars will rise to 8.5 million vehicles by 2020 from 5.2 million last year, said Michael Wynn- Williams, a London based analyst at consulting company Global Insight Inc. Stanley Electric.

Koito faces competition from Stanley Electric, which in February raised its stake in Lumax Industries, India's largest maker of automotive lighting, and a supplier to Tatas Nano. Stanley owns 46.3 per cent of Lumax, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Lumax makes headlamps for Tatas Indica Xeta hatchback, Safari Dicor sport- utility vehicle (SUV), Sumo Victa SUV and Ace truck, according to it's website.

Tokyo- based Stanley started transferring technology to Lumax in 1984 and began investing in the company in 1994. Koito plans to increase research and development to five per cent this fiscal year to 21.9 billion yen. Research spending as a percentage of estimated sales of 474.6 billion yen will be little changed at 4.6 per cent, according to the company.

Swift sales shoot up to 2 lakh units

COUNTRY'S largest car maker Maruti Suzuki’s runaway success with Swift has crossed a new milestone in sales — two lakh units — with the car becoming one of the fastest selling models in India since its launch three years ago to achieve this feat.

Maruti Swift has attained new benchmarks very swiftly. It has emerged as the fastest selling car in India by completing the two- lakh units sales mark in less than 36 months, a company official said.

The company launched this premium hatchback in petrol variant on May 25, 2005. In its first year of launch, it clocked sales of 61,200 units. The popularity of petrol version inspired the company to launch a diesel variant in January last year.

Who is scoring in the war of sedans?

It’s the ride quality where Logan scores over Dzire. On most other counts, it’s the Maruti sedan that offers more value for money.

AFTER SELLING like hot property in the A3 segment for a year, the Mahindra Renault Logan 1.5 diesel now faces stiff competition from the country’s largest automobile manufacturer’s latest avatar Maruti Suzuki Swift Dzire.

The Logan is powered by a 4- cylinder, 1461cc, 1.5 Dci engine, and the Dzire is equipped with a multijet diesel 1248cc engine. To distill this technical mumbo- jumbo, the Dzire is more powerful and produces excellent acceleration thrust. Yet the slower Logan should not be dismissed off- hand – it has enough spunk to beat city traffic. Fire up both the engines, and there is the rattle and hum typical of diesel cars.

Between the two, it is the Renaults engine that makes its audible presence felt. Both have a 5- speed manual transmission, but the Dzire tops with its precise gear ratio and smooth shift. Needless to say, the Logans gearbox is not as slick as the Swift sedans. The Renault cars third gear has a tall ratio that may force frequent changing of gears.

When it comes to ride quality, the Logan scores. The Renault easily negotiates dirt roads. And the Dzire seems to take sadistic pleasure in making you feel each bump on the road. At a glance, neither the Dzire, nor the Logan are stunning beauties.

The Renault has an outdated 1980s boxy look that needs at least a set of nice- looking alloy wheels and a rear spoiler to give it a passable makeover. Maruti has played its trump card and transformed its Swift hatchback into the Dzire. The sedan, therefore, retains the sporty look of the hatchback at the front, with the thick line of chrome at the rear being a take- off of the Nissan Teana and the BMW 7- Series.

Looked at from the side, though, the Dzires silhouette is awkward given its disproportionate aspects, but compared to the Logan, the Swift sedan looks contemporary and fresh. When it comes to interiors, the Dzire leaves the Logan squirming in embarrassment. As Maruti has borrowed most of the Swifts interiors, there is a sense of familiarity with the Dzires dash and the instrument cluster.

The high- end ZDI trim gets steering wheel mounted audio controls and an automatic climate control, which are both firsts in the category. The integrated audio system is neatly tucked away in the dash and is user friendly. The Logan's interiors are tacky. The beige colour adds to the cheapness of the look. The inside door handles look down market. Improper placement of the power- window buttons on the central console under the air vents requires almost a GPS system to locate them during driving. The instrument cluster, though, is clear, big and simple.

The Renault is the only car that has an onboard computer in this class. The Logans trump card is the ample leg, head and shoulder room available. It has a 510- litre boot space, which is generous in comparison to the Dzires 400 litres, which had to be shaved to accommodate the intrusions from the trunks flab. The fuel average is high for both the cars. The Logan gives 18 kmpl in city conditions and 24 kmpl on highways; the Dzire returns 14 kmpl and 18 kmpl, respectively.

The Dzire costs Rs 6.7 lakh and the Renault, Rs 6.9 lakh. Not much of a price difference, but the Maruti sedan gives more value for money. Given that they are entry- level sedans, the Logan and the Dzire have a lot going for them.

Maruti hikes prices of its models as input costs rise

INDIA'S largest car maker Maruti Suzuki India Ltd, on Monday raised prices of most of its models to offset the rising cost of inputs such as steel.

The price hike ranges from Rs 1,000 on the Zen Estilo and Wagon R hatchback to Rs 18,000 on its sedan Swift Dzire. The company had launched the Swift Dzire sedan with an introductory price ranging from Rs 4.49 lakh to Rs 6 lakh across different variants, which has now been withdrawn, a Maruti dealer said.

Maruti has also hiked the prices of all petrol variants of hatchback Swift, SX4 and Gypsy by Rs 9,000, while the price of the diesel version of Swift has been raised by Rs 15,000. It has also increased the price of all variants of Zen Estilo and WagonR LPG by Rs 1,000 and of Alto and M800 by Rs 1,500.

Prices of all variants of Omni and WagonR Petrol have also been hiked by Rs 2,000 and that of multi- utility vehicle Versa by Rs 8,000. The price increases, which spared the Grand Vitara SUV, came into effect at the weekend, he said.

Maruti's managing director, Shinzo Nakanishi, had said in April that the car maker was negotiating with steel companies on new contracts, for which it faced up to a 40 per cent price increase. Earlier, Maruti had cut prices of some of its models, after the government reduced excise duty on small cars.