Toyota unveils Innova, eyes 10% market share

Toyota Kirloskar Motors on Thursday launched Innova, the first model to be launched in the country from the company's innovative international multi purpose vehicle (IMV) project. The launch also comes close on the heels of the phasing out of its top selling model Qualis.

"We intend to secure a 10 per cent share of the automobile market in the country by 2010. Innova is a step towards attaining this goal," said Fujio Cho, president, Toyota Motor Corporation.

Innova has been designed to incorporate the positive points of both multi-purpose vehicles as well as passenger cars. It will be manufactured at Toyota Kirloskar's Bidadi plant which has an annual capacity of 60,000 units.

The company intends to sell 45,000 units of Innova in 2005, 40 per cent of which is expected to go to the south. It also hopes to sell 4,500 units in the first month itself.

Toyota Kirloskar is targeting total car sales of nearly 58,000 for the whole year. The company closed 2004 with sales of nearly 47,000.

According to Toyohiko Ino, director-marketing division, TKM, "We have invested around Rs 1,500 crore in the manufacturing plant. Of this, Rs 600 crore was for Innova. The product involves nearly 70 per cent localisation, where only the engine and transmission have been imported."

About the future product possibilities from the Toyota stable in India, Cho said, "We are also involved in studying the market for the possibilities of introducing future product segments, including compact cars. These studies also involve other companies of the Toyota group."

According to a company statement, the Innova would be available in five variants. While the petrol version is priced between Rs 6.74 lakh and Rs 9.28 lakh, ex-showroom Bangalore, the diesel model is priced between Rs 7.32 lakh and Rs 9.86 lakh.

The company added that there are no plans to re-introduce the Qualis and it will continue with servicing existing customers.