Tata Motors Working On Global Products
Tata Motors is one of the biggest and oldest vehicle manufacturers in India. The company has been building trucks and buses for a long time now. The first passenger vehicle from Tata Motors came in the 1990s and there has been no turning back since then. Tata Motors sells many vehicles in Europe, Asia and Africa, including the Indica Vista, Indigo Manza, Safari and Aria (pictured above). However, these products haven’t shaken the market so far.
We all are aware about Tata Motors’ acquisition of Jaguar Land Rover in 2008. While Tata Motors has been able to transform the balance sheet of JLR into the positive, the more important benefit for the Indian automaker is the pool of talent and technology it now has access to. Just recently, Tata Motors announced its plans to increase market share in India by bringing in world class global products. The company says their upcoming vehicles will shock the nation.
While details about Tata Motors’ upcoming vehicles are still very sketchy, rumors point to the next generation Defender (due in 2015) and next generation Safari sharing platforms. The next generation Nano is being developed keeping global markets in mind and will certainly go on sale in Europe and the States. The next generation Indica, Indigo and Aria will also be developed with global tastes in mind and could serve as an alternative to Hyundai and Skoda’s entry level cars in many markets.
Top Gear had tested the City Rover (Indica in the UK) a few years back and they had nothing positive to talk about. Do you think the next generation of Tata vehicles would find acceptance with European tastes? Have you driven a Tata vehicle?
Faisal Ali Khan is the editor of MotorBeam.com, a website covering the auto industry of India.
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Tata will do what every other new entry does... sell on price. If they can get it low enough, it will sell, at least enough to get them into the market. With the JLR connection they have the resources to have a followup plan from that which is where most entry level marques make their mistake; Lada or Yugo anyone?
If JLR are essentially designing all of TATA's future cars then they should have no problem designing a car with appeal in western markets. TATA's purchase of JLR just keeps getting better for Mr Tata.