Daihatsu, market leader in Japan’s minicar segment since 2006, plans to launch a new minicar next year that will be as fuel efficient as petrol-electric hybrids, company president Koichi Ina told reporters in Osaka.
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”We’d like to increase our presence by boosting the efficiency of a gasoline engine thoroughly to emphasise considerations to environmental conservation,” Ina said.
The new 660cc minicar is designed to achieve economy of 30km/litre (about 84mpg) in Japan’s regulatory fuel efficiency mode, JC08. This compares with 32.6km for Toyota’s Prius hybrid, 26km for Honda’s Insight hybrid and 22.6km for Suzuki’s Wagon R minicar.
Ina told Kyodo News that Daihatsu hopes to keep its annual minivehicle sales at the present level of about 600,000 units in Japan and will concentrate overseas operations in Indonesia and Malaysia.
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By GlobalData
