A few ago, we scooped you on Toyota's plans for India with the new Yaris hatch, Yaris sedan and RAV4 softroader. Though there has been no further news on the RAV4, the Car India magazine has confirmed this month that the Yaris sedan is coming soon.
The other news though is Toyota's plan to finally get the Fortuner to India after a long internal debate. The SUV will be imported as a CKD and will be assembled locally. Since they are targeting the CR-V with the Fortuner, the RAV4 plans for India look a little meek now. The Fortuner will most probably hit showroom floors by mid-2009.
Also on the cards is the diesel variant of the Altis. Unfortunately though, the engine mountings for the 2.0-litre diesel mill that is already sold in the Altis in the UK are different than the petrol. Toyota hence is considering a tuned version of the 1.4-litre mill from the Yaris sedan in the diesel Altis. This will further help reduce costs due to the platform sharing.
The hottest news though, is that of two low-cost cars that Toyota are working on.
An entry level sedan, which is said to be based on the Yaris platform again, is being developed with a $8000 (INR 4-lakh) figure in mind. The car is in its final stages of development and will be produced in India by 2010 and in Brazil by 2011. Both the countries will play as a mass production hub for this car to export to the rest of the world. Another low cost car is a hatch which is being targeted at $5000 (INR 2.5-lakh) to penetrate into the fast growing ultra-low-cost-city-car segment which will soon see TATA, Hyundai and Nissan-Relnault-Bajaj as the major players. The car though will be launched ages after the others come out into the market, with the most probable year being 2015. Since the two cars will be ultra cheap as compared to other Toyotas, it may harm their brand image, and hence the Jap firm is considering a new brand for these apart from its current siblings - Lexus and Dihatsu.
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