Luxury car manufacturer Jaguar, on Monday, launched the Jaguar F-Type in India. The two-seater convertible sports car will be available in two variants—F-Type S and the F-Type VXS - in India.
The Tata Motors-owned Jaguar’s F-Type S is priced at Rs. 1.37 crore. The F-Type VX S is priced at Rs. 1.61 crore (ex-showroom, pre-octroi, Mumbai). The F-Type S is powered by a V6 3-litre petrol engine.
Addressing a press conference, Rohit Suri, Vice-President, Jaguar & Land Rover (JLR) India, said the company was looking at a lot of ‘spin-off’ benefits with the launch of the F-Type. “While the automobile industry in India is not doing too great overall, Jaguar is having a fantastic run,” he added.
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Without providing specific figures, Mr. Suri said that Jaguar’s sales in the first quarter of the current fiscal ending June 2013 were up 68 per cent. This was driven by the locally-assembled Jaguar XF 2.2 litre diesel sedan.
Jaguar Land Rover assembles the Land Rover Freelander 2 and the Jaguar SF sedan in India at Tata Motors’ Pune facility. He said the company was considering the possibilities of assembling other products from the JLR stable in India.
The sports car market in India is small, “but Jaguar is not looking for large volumes. We want to showcase the F-Type as a ‘halo’ product with the other products benefiting from it.” On the possibility of an entry-level Jaguar being introduced in India, Mr. Suri said, “we can expect some action in the future but not necessarily in the next one year.”
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U.K strike
JLR’s production in the U.K. may be affected as a result of employees of logistics giant DHL planning to go on strike demanding higher wages. DHL is involved in managing the warehousing operations and delivering parts at three of JLR’s plants in the UK.
A JLR spokesman said there was no production loss yet. “We are not involved with the strike and are monitoring the situation. But we are preparing for potential disruption of production and have plans in place if a situation arises.”