The brand with a history of 82 years of rise and falls, hard and good times, Datsun, after its merger with Nissan in 2012 has been revived once again and is all ready this time to hit the Indian market with full throttle.
Renault-Nissan supremo, Mr Carlos Ghosn in New Delhi on 15 July declared the relaunch of the Japan originated brand in India and also disclosed the future plans of Datsun in India under Renault-Nissan operations commencing with the latest in-line Datsun Go car, which is based on the Dat-Go car, launched a century ago in Japan.
Datsun head, Vincent Cobee claims that the car will be launched soon in India in early 2014 and will be competing against the B segment hatchbacks in India which is currently led by the Tata Nano. The company head also commits to provide the best to market at the cheapest rates and celebrates realisation of Indian dreams of buying a car, a proper first time buy. Which in India is a big ceremonial matter for many middle class and lower middle class families.
The key for the company in India will be Dream, Access and Trust which very easily meets the desire ability of the Indian minds while buying their first ever car. Let’s see how they bring this vision to reality, looks good and promising on papers and speeches though!
The first car, the Go will be a regular 5-door hatchback with FWD, mechanized by a 1.2 litre petrol engine paired with a basic 5-manual transmission system and will be stressed to compensate the stop and go traffic strength.
The car measures 1.6 m in width, 1.4 m in height and 3.7 m in total length with a wheelbase of 2.4 m.
The car will be designed by the Nissan’s design centre in Japan but the R&D and engineering development work will be carried out on local engineering resources and suppliers, in order to keep the costings healthy yet flavoursome according to the market with total value for every penny spent on it.
Expect a good quality of interiors and standard safety measures as regular with a specially upgraded mobile docking station in the car to connect to your smartphones and work via voice command for some works including the audio and connectivity dial-ups.
And finally, the car will be produced at the Renault-Nissan plant in Chennai sharing the same V platform with the Nissan Micra.
The car, being a CMF- A platform member will be priced very competitively somewhere under 4 lacs and will be launched in the markets of India, including Indonesia, Russia and south Africa.
While the company stresses mostly on value and reliability, it will be interesting to watch how reliable the words will be to the ultimate product. Be tempted till then and start saving for your first car, it might be a Datsun Go!
