)
French automobile major Renault is launching the highly indigenised 'Kwid', a car to be priced below Rs 4 lakh. Carlos Ghosn, chairman and chief executive of both Renault and Nissan, was in Chennai for the launch of the compact hatchback. A talk with T E Narasimhan and select journalists. Edited excerpts:
On Indian engineering.
There is a difference between watching a soccer game on TV and playing it. Today, we are in the game, doing it ourself and with a very strong team. We are marrying Indian skills with French and Japanese skills. Nobody has done this before. When you make people work together, you have the experience of a global market married with local creativity.
I am a big admirer of engineering in India because India has a particular skill in frugal engineering. We've done it here — based a technical centre, hired engineers, made a platform and made a car.
If this car is a success, which we think it will but we need to demonstrate it, it will be the best tribute for how much Indian engineering can support global engineering into doing things which were impossible at the beginning. I don’t think we could have done this car from Japan or from France. Nor could this car have been done in India only with Indian engineering. You need the fusion of the experience and knowledge from global market and the creativity of Indian engineering. This is the secret behind the Kwid.
ALSO READ: Driving into the crowd
On other markets for the Kwid.
The priority is India and its region. Everything else (other places) are in projects, discussion, planning —which means nothing is decided. This car has been developed with the main objective for India, since it's a big market and a great test in terms of competitve pressure. If we can get a substantial market share in this segment with this car, we know it can compete in many other global markets.
Other potential markets which have a substantial segment like India are South America, the Middle East, Africa and some in Eastern Europe. We will first focus on India and the region. We don't know what customer demand is going to be after five years; at the most, we can forecast for three or four years. First, we need to concentrate in India.
On the Kwid’s SUV characteristics.
In all markets in the world, crossovers are dominating. It is the biggest segment growth in the US, Europe, China. We have seen from the reaction to the Duster.
On learning from the joint venture between Datsun and Ashok Leyland (for light commercial vehicles).
If you want to be successful in India, you have to make the platform in India. You can bring a car from outside and do a lot of things, but if you really want to be successful, the car has to have its genes from here. Which means the platform has to be here from the beginning. Thats why I am expecting the Kwid to do much do better than any other (in the segment), as it has its genes in India. There is 97 per cent of localisation in this car. No other car in Renault or Nissan has this kind of localisation.
This (Kwid) is the latest emanation of our belief on frugal engineering. There will be more to come.
The targeted milestone of five per cent market share for the Renault in India will be based on the push from the Duster, Lodgy and Kwid; others will also contribute.
