New Delhi: Skoda Auto’s Indian Unit is up for a major overhaul. Skoda Auto, a part of German auto giant Volkswagen, will shed its India-specific tagline, and go for a campaign more appealing to the global audiences. The company, whose Indian models include Octavia, Laura, Superb, Yeti and Fabia, will give up its “Obsessed with quality since 1895″ tagline in the final quarter of this calendar year. The new tagline for the company will be “Simply Clever”, it is yet to be seen whether this move be clever.
Speaking to reporters, Thomas Kuehl, the member of the sales and marketing board at Skoda Auto India said : “We will take over the worldwide positioning with the launch of a new car in the sedan segment.” About the former tagline of the company, he said that owing to Indian customers’ strong attachment to heritage; the company had coined that tagline in 2001.
Saatchi and Saatchi are the architects of the new facelift of the company, speaking to reporters about it, Saatchi and Saatchi India Chief Executive Kamal Basu “Quality is what you expect with every brand, especially for the price you are paying. We thought the line had lived its life and it was not a brand differentiator anymore.” He further added that Skoda’s new strategy is to target customers who have a budget of 6-7 lakhs.
Skoda’s would soon launch sub-Million sedan Rapid; it will pitched against cars like Hyundai Verna Fluidic, Maruti Suzuki SX4 and Volkswagen Vento. The price and the launch date of this car has yet not been revealed by the company, although it is speculated the car will be priced above 7 lakhs, and it is likely to be launched in the last quarter of year. The sedan segment accounts for approximately 20 percent of the total car sales in India, thus making it the second largest car segment, said Puneet Gupta, an analyst at IHS Automotive. Gupta predicted that with the dawn of Rapid, Skoda auto will be able to gather more volume in sedan market, in which the competition all set to intensify.
Skoda India Auto India Pvt. Ltd. has been in India since 2001; in the financial year that ended on 31 March 2010 the company sold 1.9 million cars. Skoda Auto sold 20,000 units in India last year and plans to increase this number to 32,000 in the current financial year.
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