There appears to be two Toyotas operating in India – one which has a crazy fan following for its Fortuner and Innova, both of which manage to sell despite sporting astronomical price tags and the other which has the Etios twins and their Cross sibling, which just do not sell! And then there is the D-segmenter Corolla which rewrites all rules of sanity and churns out a power output which is less than some 5–7 Lakh B-segment hatchbacks (diesel variant).
Now, to tackle the second Toyota we talked about, the word on the street is that the company still seems to have Daihatsu in mind for the Indian market. For the uninitiated, Daihatsu is Toyota’s low cost arm which produces more cheaper cars.
Affordability is a major factor in our country and if Toyota plans to expand in India they will have to bring in cars that cost less. While they may not really want to launch cheap cars to keep its relatively premium brand image, a new low cost brand will definitely help them grow, and Daihatsu may fit the bill!
As per a recent report on Economic Times, Takeshi Uchiyamada, Chairman of Board, Toyota Motor Corporation, in an interview did not negate the possibility of the Daihatsu brand being introduced in India. However, neither did he confirm anything concrete!
The report further adds that a feasibility study for Daihatsu has been done recently in India and vendors have shown interest to vehicles like the Terios and Xenia (both pictured on this page) which may hit the streets by the financial year 2018-19, obviously if it (Daihatsu) gets the nod.
Apart from this, Toyota is also going to launch the next-generation Innova and Fortuner. The new Innova can be expected to hit Indian shores in the first half of 2016 while the new Fortuner will have to wait till the next festive season…
