Mahindra to roll out global SUV by December

Mahindra and Mahindra, India’s top utility vehicle maker, will launch its much-awaited global sports utility vehicle, now christened XUV500, in India and South Africa by December.

The company, which sells SUVs such as Bolero, Xylo and Scorpio, will position the new vehicle above Scorpio, aiming to create a new SUV segment with the vehicle.

“We created a new segment with Scorpio. There is a wide gap between `10-11 lakh and `20 lakh range of vehicles in the SUV segment. With XUV500, we believe there is a new segment that can be created,” said Vivek Nayer, senior vice-president - marketing, automotive sector at M&M.

The market for SUVs below Scorpio is around 3 lakh units annually, wherein there are offerings like Bolero, Xylo, Safari and Innova. The market size for SUVs which are above `20 lakh is just about 25,000 units.

“We wish to create an entirely new category to bridge this huge gap,” said Nayer. Currently, Tata Motors offers its crossover, Aria, in this range.

M&M intends to position the product in the premium segment and has set up a separate assembly line at its Chakan plant near Pune. The company, however, did not divulge the investment on product development and the capacity it has created for the product.

Also, M&M plans to launch vehicles of its Korean subsidiary, Ssangyong, going ahead, which will be again high-end SUVs.
M&M has been creating a lot of buzz around XUV500, which has been under development for three years, on social networking sites like Twitter.

According to the company, the product is designed and developed entirely in-house by M&M; the XUV500 is M&M’s first global SUV platform, with significant inputs in styling and development from customers across the globe.

“It is going to be launched in the global market. In fact we did consumer research in the global markets like Western Europe and South Africa. The same product will be simultaneously launched in South Africa. Going ahead, we will evaluate all those markets wherever we are present,” said Nayer.

For distribution, the company plans to utilise its existing dealerships in domestic market and also leverage Ssangyong global dealer network.

“We have more than 200 dealerships across the country. There is a Mahindra and Ssangyong channel available internationally and both will cross-leverage each other,” said Nayer.

According to company, XUV500 is also the country’s first indigenously developed monocoque SUV with the first transverse engine offering.