Toyota Kirloskar Motor Ltd., (TKML) aims to grow sales by 8-9% this calendar year, a top official said.
“The industry will grow by 8-9%,” said Shekar Viswanathan, vice chairman and whole time director, Toyota Kirloskar Motor. “This year, we are expecting a single digit growth,” he said, adding TKML “would be happy if we could match industry growth.”
From January to May 2017, the industry grew by about 12%, owing to roll out of new models by car companies. TKML grew by 25% during the period due to demand from customers for its new and existing products.
“Most of the roll-outs happened between May 2016 and May 2017 and that’s why the percentage increase would look impressive.”
During 2016, Toyota registered a marginal decline in sales compared to the previous year. Market conditions for 2017 are positive and TKML is hopeful of growing with the market, Mr. Viswanathan said.
“Our current priority is safety and hybrid technology. We are also trying to look at leveraging the strength of our hybrid models. Currently, we offer Camry hybrid and Prius in India,” he said.
Asked about the future of the industry, he said the automobile industry itself was making choices between various types of vehicles such as electric, hybrid and internal combustion engine vehicles. Going forward, we would see a mix of three types of vehicles.
“Earlier, we only used to talk about diesel or petrol vehicles. But now the customer is going to have a choice between electric, hybrid and petrol-diesel vehicles. Since the roll out till May 2017, TKML sold 3,305 units of Camry Hybrid and 172 Prius. Projected sales plan of Camry Hybrid since the roll out up to December 2017 is 4,026 units,” he said.
Toyota was committed to equip all its vehicles with the latest in safety gadgetry, he said: “We are progressing from dual air bag systems to having at least seven air bags in the cars. Very soon, we are going to announce that several of our cars are going to come fitted with seven air bags.”
Regarding the unsold BS-III vehicles post April 1, he said: “Our inventory was zero, as we stopped manufacturing BS-III vehicles one year before the due date. We have already started working on BS-VI Models. In fact, we have put up the diesel engine plant at a cost of ₹1,200 crore in Jigani, Karnataka. We are making BS-IV engines over there, and they can be easily upgraded to BS-VI.”
