Thursday, September 22, 2011
By Pranjal Gera
Fiat dismisses plans of launching new cars till 2013-2014
Italian automobile company Fiat has announced that it would not be launching any new cars till 2013-2014, though the company is still struggling to make a mark in Indian market. The Company's CEO, in a statement, said that the company would refresh its current range of cars, but won't launch new models. He believes that the company has not been able to perform well in the market, so it would work on making its current range better and thus would try to establish itself in the market.
In the beginning of the year, the company made an official announcement that it was working on a small car that would be cheaper than Fiat Punto and Fiat Palio. But now it seems that the company has dropped the very idea of that car. At present, the company is offering three cars to the Indian market- Fiat Linea, Fiat Punto and Fiat Palio.
Just a few days ago, Fiat announced that it would be opening exlusice dealerships across the country. This announcement was made after the Fiat and Tata alliance became sour, and Ratan Tata stated that the alliance wasn't working out well and it needed to be reanalysed. Though, according to Fiat, it is not planning to part ways, and the new exlusive dealerships would be addition to its co-dealerships with Tata. The current target is set to 20 exclusive stores across the country.
Experts believe that Fiat has been been able to benefit from its high class cars, and needs to make strategies to get a better hold of the market. During the April to August period, Fiats sales went down by 23 percent.
