While the 11th generation Civic is getting ready to go on sale in the global markets, Honda’s India division has pulled the plug on the model (10th gen sedan) along with the CR-V. This is the result of Honda Cars India Ltd (HCIL) shutting down its Greater Noida plant and consolidating the manufacturing operations for vehicles and components at its Tapukara plant in Rajasthan with immediate effect for both domestic sales and exports. With that, the company’s product portfolio in India now has only 4 vehicles.
The Civic was launched in the country in March 2019 and it barely sold. Experts believe the insufficient powertrain options could be the cause, especially, not offering the 1.5L turbocharged petrol engine that is available in other markets. As for CR-V, the 5th generation model was launched in 2018. However, the Indian buyers didn’t find it as appealing as the Fortuner.
Despite an uptick in sales in the last three months, the current market conditions remain unpredictable for the industry at large. The impact of COVID-19 has pressed us to strengthen our constitution, and to achieve the same, HCIL has decided to consolidate its manufacturing operations by making the Tapukara plant a unified manufacturing base. – Gaku Nakanishi, President & CEO, HCIL
Nakanishi added that India is an extremely important market in Honda’s global strategy and the company is committed to bringing its latest models including electrified vehicles in the future.
HCIL will continue all Head Office functions, R&D Centre and warehouse operations from Greater Noida.
Recommended for you
Leave a Reply
Note: Comments that are unrelated to the post above get automatically filtered into the trash bin.
