Summary
Hyundai Motor India has the widest spread of portfolio in India. The Korean automaker has been highly aggressive since it entered the Indian car market in 1998. The Hyundai Santro was the first vehicle that the company introduced in India and since then there has been no looking back for the Korean auto maker.
The Hyundai Santro was a tall boy design and then the Accent followed. Hyundai had signed up Shah Rukh Khan as the brand ambassador for the company. Since then till now, it has a portfolio start from a Rs 2.5 lakhs hatchback to a Rs 34 lakhs SUV (Santa Fe).
Executive Management And Indian Operations
Hyundai’s plant is based in Kanchipuram district, Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu. This is where the company’s both the plants are located and the company inaugurated its first plant in 1998. The second plant was opened in 2008 and both these plants have engine and body manufacturing, quality test, advance production and a lot more testing facilities. The new 2008 plant helped to increase the current production of the company in India.
Mr. Bo Shin SEO is currently the CEO and Managing Director of HMIL (Hyundai Motor India Limited). The other people who are holding key responsibilities in this company are Puneet Anand and Devdatta Mulchandani (Deputy General Manager) and Mr Rakesh Srivastava. The head office is in the NCR.
Then the company even has an R&D facility in Hyderabad. This is called as Hyundai Motor India Engineering. Hyundai is the largest car exporter from India and it has maintained that reputation even now as it ships to about 120 countries across the world from the Chennai port.
Products And Services
Hyundai is offering one of the widest range of portfolio in India at the moment. Its most affordable vehicle is the Eon, which competes with the Alto 800, while the most expensive Hyundai is the Santa Fe, which is priced at about Rs 34 lakhs. This gives a potential car buyer a huge variety to consider from. The company at the moment has over 1000 touch points and about 450 dealerships. The company is looking at adding more touch points to become more competitive with Maruti.
Environmental Initiatives - CNG and LPG
As environment initiatives in India, Hyundai is offering its vehicles with CNG and LPG kits. In the global market it will soon have hybrid and electric vehicles on offer too. But for India, at the moment there are no such plans from Hyundai. It is targeting the volume segments and working towards making its brand more premium.
Founder And First Car
Hyundai Motor Company was launched in India in 1998 and it came out with the Santro as its first car. The company had opened its plant in Chennai, Tamil Nadu and then the Santro was a competition to none. It had created a new segment for itself as it was priced similar to the Zen, but it was a tall boy design. This new hatchback was highly successful for Hyundai and then there was no looking back. Hyundai introduced the Accent, then the Getz and the list continued.
USP
Hyundai’s funky looking design, feature loaded interiors, aggressive pricing and fuel efficient vehicles. All this makes it a great package to consider, not to forget the company’s reach across the length and breadth of the country, which is second to Maruti Suzuki. The new added products like the Grand i10, XCent, Elite i20, i20 Acive and the Creta have been highly successful products and have given Hyundai a success into the premium hatchback segment, which wasn’t the case so far for Maruti Suzuki.
Resale Value
Hyundai vehicles have low ownership cost, high fuel efficiency, stylish design and one of the more feature loaded vehicles. The Hyundai range of products offer a good value for your money and hence many car buyers are moving from Maruti to Hyundai for a change. Hyundai has one of the highest level of localisation too. This has helped the Korean car brand to reduce the price of its vehicles.
Competition
The biggest competitor to Hyundai is Maruti Suzuki. The Korean brand is looking at dethroning Maruti Suzuki to claim the top spot in the country as the highest selling car maker. At the moment, Hyundai is above 20 percent and it is looking at adding more to its portfolio. There is still some good time to go before it could catch up with Maruti Suzuki. Hyundai is looking at adding more value to its existing product portfolio, increasing its production capacity and even adding more dealerships to match up with Maruti Suzuki’s network and sales numbers.
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