The Hindu Business Line : Volvo Car India looking at preferred finance solution partner

Mumbai June 4 Volvo Car India, a division of Ford India that would be selling Volvo vehicles in the country by the end of this year is looking at the possibility of having a preferred financial solutions partner. The financial partner would offer tailor-made financial solutions for prospective Volvo buyers in the country.

Mr Paul De Voijs, Managing Director, told Business Line that the company is exploring the possibility though currently there have been no talks with any of the local leading banks.

Volvo would be the second luxury carmaker to strike a deal with one of the leading banks in the country; BMW has tied up with ICICI Bank to offer tailor-made financial solutions for its prospective buyers. Such a tie-up allows the automaker to avail themselves of a range of financial services that would include competitive interest rates. It may also include innovative and quality premium quality of service like BMW has across its nationwide dealership network and ICICI's Direct Sales Agency (DSA).

New launches

It's not clear whether this service would be available when the vehicles are launched by the end of this year; "though ideally we would prefer to offer it from the very beginning," said Mr Paul. The company is gearing up for its forthcoming car launches of the Volvo S80 (luxury sedan) and the Volvo XC90 (sports utility vehicle).

Volvo will introduce these two models with three engine offerings; 2.5 litre (diesel), 3.2-litre (petrol) and 4.4-litre (petrol) that will be available on both the models respectively; they will be available with a semi-automatic gearbox.

The vehicles are currently undergoing homologation process at the Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI) that is likely to be completed by August-September. The company was set to launch the vehicles in 2006-end but due to delay in meeting certain homologation requirements from Volvo's end, the company is now scheduled to launch it this year-end said Mr Paul.

Ford support

These vehicles will be imported through the CBU (completely built unit) route from Sweden though it does make sense to use Ford India's facility as and when the company decides to assemble its cars in the country. As of now, there has been no discussion between the two companies; however, Volvo will take Ford India's support on various operations such as human resource, homologation procedure, information technology, logistics, accounting and taxation practice while it would focus on products, pricing, marketing strategy, network.

There are no plans for common platform strategy to be shared between the two companies, said Mr Paul.

The company has identified Mumbai, Delhi and Chandigarh as primary cities where it would have its first set of dealerships present in the country.

The company would expand to Hyderabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Kochi, Kolkata and Jaipur at the end of 2008.

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