Saturday June 23, 02:49 AM
Ford eyeing Northern region to push sales
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By Prashant Krar
Ford India is eyeing high growth luxury car market in North to push up sales of its latest offering the new premium SUV Endeavour lauched here on Friday. The NRI dominated Punjab region tops the priority list of Ford which formally launched Endeavor in four zones namely Bangalore , New Delhi , Chennai and Chandigarh in the last two days , Arind Mathew, manager director and president Ford India said. The North region has been the mainstay of Ford India 's growth in the last fiscal registering a 10% higher growth than the national average in the mid sized segment. In the previous fiscal the four-Ford products namely Ikon, Fusion, Endeavour and the Fiesta registered a robust 32% growth in the North. There are still no signs of car industry bailing out of the slowdown in sales so far affected by the higher lending rates and measures taken by the government to check inflation," Mathew said. "Though Ford India attempted to cushion the impact by launching a finance scheme offering lower rate of interest to customers in the previous month but sales have failed to pick up," he revealed. "High lending rates has marred any prospect of continuing with the previous year's growth but the sales are expected to gain some momentum in the coming months," Mathew told FE. "The slump affected due to dearer debt is perceptible in other sectors as well including real estate," he pointed. The company is relying heavily on new launches to push up the sales in themonths to come. "The new launch is expected to revitalise the slowing sales growth," he said. Mathew said in the recent years Ford Motors's interest in Indian market has increased manifold which can be gauged from the fact that company would launch two-products in India in the current year. "The diesel version would be launched in next two-three months,' he said. Meawhile, Mathew has high hopes from the region which would respond warmly to the new Ford Endeavor. "The region responded tremendously to Ford products in the past registering highest sales growth in the country," he said. ''The Ford Endeavour has already been the highest selling premium SUV in the Indian market. The new Endeavour with its commanding road presence, comfort, flexibility, safety and robustness, is the ideal action SUV for the modern family'', Mathew added.
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