Tuesday, March 12, 2013
By Pawan Rana
Toyota to boost exports, new Etios and Etios Liva launched
The Japanese car maker Toyota is in a mood to reform the Indian car market with just two models – Toyota Etios and Toyota Etios Liva and it seems that it will be able to do so soon. With an aim to increase its presence in the car market, the car maker has just launched the refreshed version of its sedan Etios and the hatchback Etios Liva. The most striking thing is that the price of the hatchback now starts at as low as Rs 4.46 lakh and this makes it highly affordable and appealing as well. Meanwhile, the car giant also hopes to increase the export of these two cars to Africa in the near future. In less than a year, the company has shipped over 20k Etios series cars to South Africa and it is believed that with the increase in demand there the company will soon be able to export more cars.
In India the Etios Liva rivals the Maruti Swift while the Etios sedan is a close competitor of Swift Dzire. This said, the car maker believes that the new price tag will be making the sedan as well as the hatchback more appealing and more lucrative in the respective segment and this will also lead to an increased domestic consumption of the production. This will also help the car maker utilize the full capacity of the production as it has started producing the engine and transmission for these cars in house there by increasing the localization levels further. But exports are at prime for the company as it is the exports that help the car makers recover from any losses in the domestic market.
Though the recent price revision is over 2.1 percent more than the earlier price of these cars but still the price rise after the Budget is meager and it will not impact its sales adversely. The new models of the two are based on the changes made following customer feedback and reviews.
