Following Maruti Suzuki India’s media launch of the redesigned Swift Swift hatchback in New Delhi today, it also plans an upgraded DZire sedan soon.
“We are planning to launch a [new R3] model early next year,” IV Rao, managing executive officer (engineering), told just-auto though he declined to elaborate.
Meanwhile, increasing petrol prices and the growing diesel market in India have led to the company to further ramp up diesel engine production.
“Current diesel engine production capacity is 240,000 units annually, which is going to be hiked further to 300,000 by the end of the current financial year,” said Rao.
The outgoing Swift, launched in 2005, sold over 600,000 units in six years. Maruti Suzuki spent INR550 crore (US$122m) on the new model and 100 Indian engineers worked with the global team at Suzuki headquarters in Japan.
“The model is produced on the new assembly line at the Manasar plant, where production of the Swift has been further ramped up from 12,000 units to 17,000 units [a month] in the next few months,” said Rao.
The revamped Swift is 95% localised. Maruti has already taken over 50,000 orders for the new version.
