Business - India;Audi lines up new launches

Chanchal Pal Chauhan

DELHI: German luxury car maker Audi will launch an array of new products to triple its annual sales to 3,000 units by 2010. The company has already launched five models in the last 22 months of its operations in India.

It had achieved sales growth of 312% to 884 units in the January-October period against 292 units in the corresponding period last year. Audi plans to launch a series of coupes, convertibles, and the small sedan A1 in India in near future to sustain its current top gear growth.

The company launched its award-winning super sports car R8 at a price of Rs 1.17 crore (excluding local taxes and transportation cost) in Delhi on Friday.

Audi India managing director Benoit Tiers told ET, “India is the fastest growing market in the world for Audi, even faster than China, where we sell a lakh units every year.

It makes sense to bring our new cars here to tap the potential by extending our portfolio which will be done in a phased manner. We are looking at building volumes to gradually emerge one of the top three luxury car companies in India.”

Audi has invested 30 million euros at its Aurangabad facility in Maharashtra which has a capacity of 1,500 units per annum and currently produces 1,000 units annually. It will be putting in more money into the Indian operations to raise capacity.