Honda receives 5,000 bookings in 10 days for new City

Honda Cars India took the covers off its new City sedan in Delhi today. Kicking off with a starting price of Rs 849,990 for the manual transmission (MT) basic petrol edition, the City is on sale in 4 MT petrol options, 3 CVT petrol variants and 4 diesel trims with MT. The new flagship grade ZX diesel is priced at Rs 1356,990 (all prices ex-showroom Delhi).

The new City has received 5,000 bookings within 10 days of start of bookings from February 3. Deliveries will commence immediately, according to Jnaneswar Sen, senior vice-president (sales and marketing), Honda Cars India.

The City, which was first launched in India in 1998, has sold over 650,000 units till date. This includes 220,000 units of the fourth-generation City that hit the roads since January 2014. The new City comes with more advanced safety and technology features like the infotainment system.

Yoichiro Ueno, president and CEO, told Autocar Professional on the sidelines of the City’s launch that Honda would now be actively targeting sales in Tier 3 and Tier 4 towns to add new markets and new customers. The carmaker has added 50 dealerships in its network this fiscal, taking up the total count to 332 in 220 cities.

“Till last year we were predominantly selling in Tier 1 and 2 cities but this year we have been actively looking at Tier 3 and 4 towns,” said Ueno.

The City will be manufactured at both the Tapukara and Greater Noida plants based on market demand. The Tapukara facility had recently undergone capacity expansion and can produce 180,000 cars. However, manpower and equipment will also have to be added commensurately

Meanwhile, Honda Cars India has deferred its plans to set up its third manufacturing facility at Gujarat for a couple of years according to Ueno, who says that due to demonetisation, sales were impacted and currently volumes can be taken care of by both the existing plants. Once the automotive market in India starts growing at a rapid pace, then Honda would reconsider setting up its Gujarat factory.

In terms of the upcoming emission regime change, Ueno is of the opinion that India is following European emission regulations in terms of BS-VI which are tough norms. Since the technology for meeting these norms is already available with Honda in Europe, the same technology will be used in India.

Work on tweaking this technology and customising it for India is currently underway at the carmakers end. “The challenge will be in providing an affordable solution to customers,” he said.

While admitting that the same technology will be harnessed in India, he maintained that the company is reviewing specifications and materials that could be alternated to make the end product affordable. Regarding upcoming safety regulations, Ueno feels the government should revisit its rules related to the car length limiting it to 4 metres to draw exemptions. This stems from the need to increase the front overarches to absorb crash impacts of the vehicle. This in turn necessitates reducing the cabin size that would squeeze space within causing discomfort to passengers. 

Also read: Why the new City is more important for Honda Cars India than ever before