A senior Honda Car India official told IndianAutosBlog.com that the Honda Mobilio, launching in July, is principally intended for personal car buyers.
Replying to an email questionnaire, HCIL's senior vice president of marketing and sales, Mr. Jnaneswar Sen, says the MPV market adds up to about 12,000 units a month, making it a 100k+ unit annual market. The market grew well a year ago, but in the previous fiscal, it dropped. Sen says this is in line with the industry degrowth and that the Mobilio's launch will revive this segment.
Positioning of the Mobilio would be between the Maruti Ertiga and Toyota Innova. The vehicle will appeal not only to MPV segment customers with many family members but also to families which have traditionally opted for a sedan or an SUV. These customers have functional requirement of a 7 seater but have a hesitation of buying an MPV. Honda aims to reach out to those customers, he elaborated.
Sen would not rule out out the Mobilio RS variant for India post the launch. He however did not comment when we asked him if an outdoor or adventure variant with body enrichment and exposed spare wheel was also in the offing.
