Many Eye Tata Nano

Tata Motors's small car’ Nano has already attracted a long queue of customers. They are the taxi operators and BPO cab drivers across the country.
Many taxi drivers have postponed their plans to buy new cars and prefer to wait for Micro to hit the market next year. Tata Motors is likely to showcase Micro prototype at the Auto Expo to be held at New Delhi.
The car is expected to hit the roads by end of 2008 and bookings are expected to begin much earlier. The small car will have a 600 cc engine and a seating capacity for four persons.
BPO cab vendors are also eagerly awaiting the small car. Tata’s Indica and Sumo have for long been the preferred vehicles on account of high fuel efficiency, easy maintenance and easy affordability.
Tour operators and BPO cab fleet owners feel the cars provide enough power to run their operations at a lower cost.
Taxi owners’ and cab vendors around the country swear by Tata Motors’ hatchback car Indica and multi-utility vehicle Sumo. Indica is the single largest used taxi across commercial transport in India. The diesel and CNG versions remain the most fuel efficient hatchback in its segment.
Inspite of spiraling costs, Tata persistently worked out the cost/profit ratio and has managed to stick to Rs one lakh target, it had set for itself. Taxi operators and BPO cab vendors want to have a combined fleet of Tata Indica and Micro to achieve optimum operational costs.
The worst hit will be the auto rickshaw manufacturers. Currently, an auto rickshaw cost Rs 1.4 lakh (ex-showroom), an Indica car costs Rs 3.5 lakh and an ambassador car costs Rs 4.5 lakh onwards. Auto rickshaw owners are also eagerly awaiting its release and want to upgrade their services. The advent of Indica and Sumo into the market phased out India’s favorite Ambassador cars.
However the hitch is whether the government will allow Tata’s Rs one lakh car for commercial purposes. The taxi operators are keeping their fingers crossed over the government’s decision to allow vehicle. They hope that the small car will be a major hit in the intra city operations and also the tourism segment. It could also create huge employment opportunities in smaller cities which have a huge chunk of unemployed youth.
The small car will be available in both diesel and petrol versions. The diesel version contains the new common rail direct fuel injection developed by Bosch, German leader in automotive component manufacturing, especially for the low cost car.
The taxi fleet operators hope that diesel version will fetch them high fuel efficiency than petrol.
They are expecting the small car to repeat the success of one-ton truck Tata ACE. It was a runaway success and sells more than any other light commercial vehicles and three-wheelers and is the highest selling small utility truck in Indian market.