Diesel cars to drive biz: Hyundai MD

Hyundai Motor also launched its new premium sports utility vehicle (SUV) Tucson for the Indian market.

Tarun Garg, Director (Sales, Marketing and Service) said the timing of Tucson’s launch is right as there are over five lakh Creta buyers in the country who are looking for an upgrade to a premium SUV.

 The new Tucson’s starting price is about Rs 22 lakh. “With over 6.5 million customers worldwide, Tucson is one of the best-selling SUV’s across the world,” SS Kim, MD-CEO told reporters.

 He said the model was unveiled at the Auto Expo 2020.

 Garg said the booking for diesel engine models are growing and the demand is across the country and more so from tier 2/3 cities.

 He said when the fuel prices go up, buyers will look at fuel economy and diesel engines are fuel efficient. According to Garg, Hyundai Motor has got over 45,000 bookings for its SUV Creta model and 56 per cent of that are for diesel engine variant.

 Similarly, one third of the booking for Venue and Verna are for diesel models, Garg said.

 “SUV lovers want much more than the fuel economy which diesel vehicles offer. It appears demand will stabilise at this level. There is also good demand for petrol models,” Garg added.