India's largest Auto maker and volumes player Maruti Suzuki (MSIL), has today announced that it will introduce its first fully 'Made in India' car in the next four years.
Maruti Suzuki which yesterday launched another great product from its stable known as 'A-Star' in India, at an attractive introductory price of Rs 3.47-4.12 lakh, has already began the work on its future product which is totally focused, designed and developed in and for India.
"We have started the ground work to launch a car which is conceived, designed and developed fully in India," said Mr.I.V. Rao, MSIL Managing Executive Officer (Eng.) to media.He also mentioned that Maruti is looking to roll it out in 4 years time, a time frame similar to what Tata Motors took for designing and developing the Tata Nano
However, he did not comment whether it would be a small or big car. Now, we take a guess- It has to be a small car, something like a modern interpretation of the aging Maruti 800 which might be phased out in the year 2010. It should compete with Hyundai and GM's small car for the future. Maruti will also look to make a small car which can use flexible powertrains like hybrid, electric etc.
"We are discussing it internally," Rao said, adding groundwork such as preparing for manpower, capacity and other related infrastructure has started.
MSIL's 'Made In India' car will be the next major step in the company's efforts to achieve its goal of developing products on its own. "Our ultimate aim is to have products developed on our own," Mr.Rao said.
MSIL engineers have also played an important role in the development of the A-Star, which is Suzuki's fifth global model.
IAB Comment- A while back we heard about Bajaj deciding to build their own car apart from the ULC/Lite. Now it's Maruti. What both Bajaj and Maruti are trying to do is collaborate with the Internationals and learn the tricks so that they can replicate it while making their own cars. Learning from the leaders is such a good idea and will do wonders to the Indian Auto Industry.
