With the upcoming launch of the Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara, the company hopes to increase its sales numbers this fiscal.Â
Maruti Suzuki India wants to increase production as the market for semiconductors improves, and the company has set a goal of producing 20 lakh units during the current fiscal year, according to Maruti Chairman RC Bhargava. He added that the upcoming Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara mid-sized SUV will be essential in achieving the target.
Maruti Suzuki’s total sales increased by 16.52 lakh units, or 13.4%, in the fiscal year 2021–2022. The pandemic and the worldwide shortage of semiconductors caused production to suffer, which resulted in the company losing sales in the first quarter of the fiscal year. Bhargava said that this mostly affected domestic models. At the end of the year, the company had about 2.7 lakh unfulfilled reservations, he said. As a result of the decline, Maruti Suzuki’s market share decreased as well, dropping from nearly 50% to 43.4% as the automaker missed out on some opportunities in the domestic market.
Bhargava predicted that vehicle production would rise this year as the situation with the shortage of semiconductors was getting better. He added that the company is putting a lot of emphasis on increasing its production numbers and that the Grand Vitara mid-size SUV will help it push that goal even further. Toyota’s factory in Karnataka will produce the Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara. He continued, “The new SUV will also feature Toyota’s powerful hybrid technology, marking the first time that cars using this technology would be produced in India.
Maruti Suzuki is focusing to enhance its SUV portfolio as it is now all the more crucial to offset the decline in sales of the non-premium hatchbacks which is the core segment of the company. This segment of the company observed a decline of 5 per cent in FY22 due to rising costs as compared to 2020-2021. “On the other hand, the SUV sector continued to grow. We did not have enough models in this segment to compete effectively, though the situation has now become much better with the launch of the remodelled Brezza and the global launch of Grand Vitara,” added Bhargava.