Audi India is looking to strengthen its Q range of cars by
bringing in an upgraded Q7 next year followed by the Q2.
“Forty per cent of our sales are from the Q range, which
include the Q7, Q5 and Q3. It will grow to 45 per cent this year when we have
the Q3 having a full run,” company head Michael Perschke said at the
inauguration of a company showroom at Bhubaneswar.
Though Audi will introduce the A3 next year, it is not
thinking of bringing its hatchbacks. “I don’t think selling luxury hatchbacks
in the Rs 20-25 lakh range is going to be very lucrative because if you add
bells and whistles to it, the price rises to Rs 26 lakh with which you can buy
the Q3,” he said.
The strategy is in contrast to that of Mercedes, which is
slated to launch the A-Class hatchback, and BMW, which is planning to bring in
its 1 series.
At present, Audi assembles the A4, A6 and the Q3 at its Aurangabad
facility where it has invested 30 million euros for five years. It will start
assembling the Q5 and the Q7 from July.
“This covers 90 per cent of our sales and so I am deriving
the maximum cost benefit from local production. We are producing 10,000-12,000
cars on a single shift per annum. The facility has a capacity of 18,000-20,000
units. We will achieve that in terms of sales by 2015,” Perschke said.
The company has set a sales target of 10,800 cars this year
after securing the No. 1 position with sales of 9,350 units in 2012-13 and
2,616 units in the first quarter of 2013.
Rivals BMW and Mercedes sold 8,416 and 7,239 cars,
respectively, in the last fiscal. In January-March, BMW sold 1,410 cars, while
Mercedes sold 2,009 cars.
Last year, Audi India had a 31 per cent share in the premium
segment, which grew by 29,000 units. Racing ahead of its rivals with a 63 per
cent growth last year, the company will be happy to post a growth of 15-20 per
cent this year, Perschke said.
“Despite the high interest rates, depreciating rupee and
rising input costs, the macro-economic conditions in India are good and we are
looking to sell as many units (i.e. 30,000 units) that we sell in Japan today
by 2020 or even more,” he said.
