Mahindra XUV500 Effect: Hyundai India planning sub 4 Meter Mini SUV?

The Mahindra XUV500 Crossover has shown the world and more importantly other automakers that a well priced and a well executed Crossover SUV has huge potential in India. Today we have a report emerging that Hyundai India, enthused by the response that the Mahindra XUV500 has garnered, is planning a mini SUV. In India, the perennial debate of SUV vs Sedan continues even as the preference for SUVs is growing as bad roads still continue to exist in India, where an SUV makes much more sense than a sedan or a hatchback.

Hyundai Veloster Concept

Hyundai’s SUV will reportedly measure under 4 meters and is currently only a concept. This Mini SUV concept could be showcased at the upcoming 2012 Indian Auto Expo, where even the Hyundai Veloster could make its show debut in India. Hyundai India actually isn’t a new player to the Crossover SUV segment. In fact, the firm had the Tucson Crossover doing duty in India in the middle of last decade, before Hyundai decided to phase out the Crossover as the carmaker saddled with the small car maker image simply couldn’t sell enough of the Tucsons to justify the models continuance in the Indian market.

Hyundai Veloster Concept

Coming to Hyundai’s Mini SUV concept, the SUV could compete with the likes of the proposed Mahindra Mini SUV, which Mahindra is developing along with its recently acquired Korean SUV maker, Ssangyong. While the Mahindra Mini SUV has targeted an ambitious INR 4 Lakh as the price point, details about the Hyundai SUV concept remain under wraps for the moment. Even so, Hyundai displaying the Mini SUV concept at the 2012 Indian Auto Expo could be a big deal as it represents the growing trend of Mini SUVs in the Indian market, which has all the potential of being viable alternatives to entry level small cars.

Via BSMotoring

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November 14, 2011 | By Jay Prashanth · Tags:

Comments

One Response to “Mahindra XUV500 Effect: Hyundai India planning sub 4 Meter Mini SUV?”

karikor on November 14th, 2011 11:35 pm

Compact Utility Vehicles will do wonderful for the Indian Car Buyer. Coz presently the out dated Maruti Gypsy and the still unreliable after sales service “Chinese made” Premier Rio are the only Compact SUVs available in the market. Now the Indian customer is dying to try out a variety of Compact SUVs (as we know how good Indian Roads are) from the leading automobile manufacturers in the country, without having to worry about the bulkiness in both size and wallet of and for a proper SUV.

Infact every auto company worth its salt should launch a suitably priced product in this new and hotly contested segment in the next 12-18 months.
And for this I say Hurray Hyundai!

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