Tata Motor’s acquisition of the legendary SUV maker Land Rover along with Jaguar gave birth to a hope that we can finally expect their Utility Vehicles to have technological wonders making them special.
The wait finally seems to be getting over. Apart from all the new products, it seems that the Tata Sumo will also get its share of magic as the company is reportedly working on a new version of India’s one time favourite people mover.
As per a report in Autocar India, the next generation Sumo, due in 2018, will be based on a new light-weight platform codenamed Raptor. This platform will be used in other budget SUVs and MUVs under the Tata Motors umbrella. The Sumo was a wonderful life bringer in the Indian Utility Vehicle segment. The market in the early 90s had very few players and Sumo got instant success thanks to its rugged build quality. The same though could not be said about its successor. No matter how Grande they sounded, they could not be Victa-orious in their attempt to woo the public. The company now hopes to change this with the Next Generation Sumo.
Unlike the traditional setups usually seen on road going vehicles, the new Raptor platform will neither be a ladder frame nor a monocoque, but will have a new body integrated frame. This simply means that the body of the vehicle will be integrated on the chassis, helping the vehicle to shed a few kilos, which should mean better overall efficiency – fuel as well as performance!
An improvement in build quality and increase in the features list is also expected which is when we expect it to become a worthy rival to Bolero (which is also getting better in the coming times).
Till then, how about some of this Sumo Extreme 4×4 Tata….(pictured on this page)?
Related: Analysis: Tata’s Q501 & Q502 Premium SUVs: What Segment & Price?
