Honda Cars India has announced their sales number for December 2018. The Japanese carmaker has registered a growth of 4 per cent selling 13,139 units of passenger vehicles in December 2018 against 12,642 units it sold in the same month last year. Honda has posted a cumulative growth of 3.7 per cent selling 134,797 units of passenger vehicles between April-December period in 2018 against 129,964 units it sold in the same period last year.
Hyundai Motor India Limited recorded domestic sales of 42,093 units in December 2018, an increase of 4.8 per cent over the same period last year. The sales were driven by the likes of the new Santro hatchback along with the hot-selling Hyundai i20 and the Hyundai Creta SUV. As compared to November 2018 though, when Hyundai India sold 43,709 units, sales for December were slightly lower. Cumulative sales in 2018 for Hyundai too were at its highest ever. Hyundai recorded overall sales of 7,10,012 units, a 4.3 per cent growth over the calendar year 2017, which recorded 6,78,221 units overall.
India's largest carmaker- Maruti Suzuki has recorded a marginal growth of 1 per cent in December 2018 selling 119,804 units of passenger vehicles against 118,560 units in the same period last year. The biggest decline in sales was seen in the entry-level segment (Alto and WagonR) which recorded a negative growth of 14 per cent selling 27,661 units in December 2018 compared to 32,146 units in the same months last year. The degrowth was followed in the compact car segment (Celerio, Swift, Ignis, Dzire and Baleno) which is the major volume driver for Maruti. The Volume in the Compact cars segment went down by 3.8 per cent selling 51,334 units against 53,336 units in the same month last year.
Tata Motors revealed to very important concepts at the 2018 Auto Expo and while we've seen the H5X evolve into the good-looking Harrier SUV, there's also the 45X premium hatchback that will hit the markets by the end of this year. With the launch still some time away, the Tata 45X hatchback was recently spotted testing and the latest spy images give a glimpse of what the cabin will look like on the Maruti Suzuki Baleno and Hyundai i20 rival. The 45X will also mark Tata's entry into an all-new segment as it aims to be present in 90 per cent of the Indian auto market in the coming years.
The Indian auto industry is going to see some new entrants in near future and one of them is the Groupe PSA which is all set to enter our market most likely in 2020. PSA seems to be testing its DS7 Crossback in India which could be its first product for our market. However, we are still uncertain about the brand PSA is considering. The DS brand is essentially a subsidiary of Citroen which has caught the fancy in the European market in last two years and rivals the German Treo. If the DS7 Crossback makes its way to the Indian market, it will rival the likes of the Audi Q3 and BMW X1.
The new Mahindra XUV300 is one of the most awaited launches of 2019 and the company is most likely to launch it in the middle of February. As we are inching closer to the launch the anticipation among enthusiasts and prospective buyers are building up even faster and we all are eager to know about this SUV even more, or should I say to see the SUV. We have been following the XUV300 quite extensively and by now have plenty of details on it and probably you too must be aware of it all if you have been following our updates. This time we have got some leaked images of Mahindra's upcoming subcompact SUV's first row and these give us quite an Idea of how it looks like on the inside.
It's the last date of 2018 and fuel prices has touched the lowest in the year today after a reduction in the fuel prices following a series of reduction in the last two month. The retail price of petrol witnessed a reduction of 20 Paise in Delhi while the retail price of Diesel went down by 23 Paise. The new retail price for Petrol in Delhi has dropped to Rs. 68.94 from Rs. 69.14 while the retail price for Diesel has dropped to Rs. 62.95 from Rs. 63.18.
The Hyundai Creta has been a runaway success for the Korean carmaker right from the start and has been India's bestselling compact SUV for long. The benchmark it has set in the segment has always been a challenge to comprehend for the competition including India's largest carmaker- Maruti Suzuki which struggles to make volume with its S-Cross. However, January 2019 is going to be rather interesting as the compact SUV segment will see not one but two new SUVs coming- the highly anticipated Tata Harrier and Nissan Kicks. carandbike team has driven both the SUVs and they not only stood on our expectations but surpassed them by a margin. While it is not possible to justify the package as the prices are still awaited, in the meantime, we are comparing their specifications to assert how well they will stand against the competition on paper.
Electric Vehicles are what we are looking to for the mobility solution in the future. The Government Of India has allotted Rs. 5500 crore for the FAME II (Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid & Electric Vehicles) Scheme and has an ambitious target to achieve 100 per cent electrification in the Automobile sector by 2030. While electric cars are still is an expensive proposition not only for car buyers but also for the auto manufacturers, electrification technology and electric two-wheelers is where most of the EV makers are concentrating on. The Electric Vehicle Expo is one platform for EV makers to demonstrate their products and technologies and in its eighth edition of the EV expo has witnessed participations going up by 35 per cent compared to the previous edition.
Here are Our Top Picks From The EV Expo
