Amid ongoing slowdown in auto sector, Maruti Suzuki India plans to launch the S-Presso hatchback, ahead of the festival season, hoping that the new model will help it turn around sales this fiscal. The Maruti Suzuki S-Presso, a new hatchback with the styling of an SUV, will be launched in India on the 30 September, 2019.
S-Presso is Maruti Suzuki’s indigenously developed, conceived, and designed vehicle that will be sold from the Arena dealership channel of the company. This would be the second product after Vitara Brezza (a compact SUV) to be designed and developed in India.
Maruti Suzuki’s latest offering – Mini SUV S-PRESSO also happens to be the first small hatchback to be launched by the company after Ignis in 2017.
“Today’s youthful customers desire a reflection of their personality in the products they own. Our internal research suggests that the criteria of buying a car for the youth, apart from affordability, acquisition cost and maintenance, now also include design and aesthetics. With Mini SUV S-PRESSO, we offer a unique, premium, feature-rich and bold car that will disrupt the entry car segment in the country,” said Shashank Srivastava, executive director (marketing & sales), Maruti Suzuki India.
The name S-PRESSO is inspired from the universally favourite coffee drink – Espresso, which stands out for its strong, robust and bold characteristics, the company said in a statement. S-PRESSO epitomises youthfulness, vitality and energy, which resonates with its target audience’s lifestyle as well.
CV Raman, senior executive director (engineering), Maruti Suzuki India, said, “Maruti Suzuki has always developed new segments and cars to match the changing needs, tastes and lifestyles of our customers. Designed in-house by Maruti Suzuki, S-PRESSO marks a big shift in the way compact cars are created and crafted in India. Its design language is inspired from our line-up of SUVs and the modern user’s lifestyle. The Mini SUV S-PRESSO is testimony of Maruti Suzuki’s journey to deliver designs, technology and experiences that are ahead of their time, taking consumers on a drive into the future.”
Battled with rising inventory amid a slowdown in demand, India’s largest carmaker posted a steep 36 per cent decline in sales in August at 93,173 units compared to 145,895 units in the same month last year. This was the second month in a row that Maruti has dispatched less than 100,000 cars to dealerships.
In this fiscal so far, passenger vehicles sales have declined by almost a quarter from a year ago. Sales have declined for 10 straight months, so far, and in 13 of the last 14 months. Adding to the woes, the outlook continues to be grim due to uncertainty over how customers will react in the run-up to the switch to BSVI emission norms in April 2020. To tide over the crisis, the government has cut the corporate tax rate to 25.17 per cent inclusive of all cess and surcharges for domestic companies.
