New Delhi, Apr 30: In a bid to continue with its dominant position in the Indian car market, Maruti today said repositioning of compact car Alto would give the customer yet
another option at the entry-level while asserting that its bread and butter model `Maruti 800` would not be phased out.
"Now, we have two cars in entry-level," Maruti Managing Director Jagdish Khattar told while asserting "Maruti 800 is still a dream of Indians, how can I replace it?"
Dismissing queries if repositioning of stripped down version of `Alto` at a marginally higher price could lead to winding up of `Maruti 800`, its first model in India, launched
20 years ago, he said it was a realisable dream for millions of two-wheeler owners who would want to have a four-wheeler.
As a result, its nearest competitor, be it Hyundai or Tata Motors, was placed at least five steps above Maruti at entry-level in terms of price range as Maruti was now offering
four different products in the price range of Rs two lakh to Rs 3.25 lakh against the starting point of Rs 3.25 lakh for `Santro` and `Indica`, he said.
With the repositioning of `Alto`, average monthly sales
of the compact car have gone up by 9,000 units a month from
an average 2,000, while `Maruti 800` continued to sell around
13,000 units a month, he said.
There will be some cannibalisation with the repositioning of `Alto` but with two more variants of the compact car `LXI` and `VXI` along with `Zen` and `Wagon R`, Maruti`s competitors were likely to lose, he said.
Bureau Report
