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After successfully taking on market leader Maruti Suzuki in the B and B+ passenger car segments Hyundai is set to strike at the last exclusive bastion of the former.
The Maruti Alto will soon find it uneasy in the A segment as the Hyundai Eon joins in to give it company. Maruti Suzuki sells an average of 25,000-30,000 units of the Alto every month, with six variants of the car.
Internally code-named the ‘HA', the new Hyundai Eon will challenge the Alto as the only urban entry small car currently available in the Indian market. The Eon is the smallest car ever produced by Hyundai Motor worldwide and the Indian subsidiary gets to launch it exclusively for the market here.
The launch is expected in the second week of October.
Built ground up to suit the Indian buyers' needs in the A segment, the HA has been constructed using one of Hyundai's six platforms that it uses for all its cars. Sporting the same ‘Fluidic' design character that was seen in the i10 Kappa2 and the new Verna, the Eon will stand out in the A and B segments and aim to attract younger buyers.
Standing just shy of 3.5 metres in length (identical to the Alto and tad shorter than the Alto K10), the new Eon continues Hyundai's penchant for Tall-boy design. But some intelligent packaging and interior design combined with the proportions of the car mean there is a surprising amount of room in the cabin.
Hyundai engineers and officials also say that Indian tastes and preferences have dictated the interior design and layout of the Eon. Homework, to ensure that every need of the Indian buyer is considered carefully apparently, included shipping about 18 brands of bottled water to design the right holder!
The Eon will feature an 800cc engine that generates 56 PS of peak power and 7.65 KgM of peak torque. The gearbox from the Santro has been carried forward into the Eon.
When driven on the test track at Hyundai's R&D centre in Namyang, the Eon was peppy and relatively refined for a car in its class, but seemed to lack a bit of low-end torque, though it must be added here that the model being driven was a pre-production car.
The Eon will join the Santro Xing, the i10 and the i20 forming a quartet of Hyundai offerings in the small car space. Hyundai officials say the Santro will continue to co-exist with the new offering, though it looks likely that the price of the Eon will be set close and could well prove to be in-house competition.
It is not clear if Shah Rukh Khan will be roped in for this one too.
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