Line up revamped but Tata Motors is still finding it difficult to sell cars

Four of ten models of Tata Motors which includes Indigo Manza, Indica Vista, Safari Storme and Tata Sumo landed in the top 10 least sold cars during the month of May.

Tata Motors Advanced and Product Engineering Dr. Tim Leverton and Tata Motors Regional Manager (South) Nakul Gupta at the launch of "Tiago" in Bengaluru, on April 18, 2016. Photo: IANS

Similar to Honda Cars' sales performance in April, four of ten models of Tata Motors which includes Indigo Manza, Indica Vista, Safari Storme and Tata Sumo landed in the top 10 least sold cars during the month of May.

Tata Motors has failed to put on a good show in May too. Its passenger car sales fell by a huge 23% to 8,617 units from 11,138 units in corresponding month last year, according to data from Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM).

This includes Indigo Manza, Indica Vista, Sumo and Safari Storme. Indigo Manza sales declined the highest with a 62.68% month-on-month (M-o-M) decline in sales during May 2016. The sales of the car had dropped to 590 units from 1,581 units sold in April 2016.

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Indica Vista was not far behind with a 46.64% M-o-M decline in sales during the month. The sales of the car had declined to 904 units in May 2016 from 1,694 units a month earlier.

Tata Sumo was at No.4 spot on the list of least sales during the month with 44.23% decline. While sales in April accounted for 814 units, in May it dipped to 454 units.

Safarai Storme was at No.7 spot with sales declining to 38.22% in May with only 333 units from 539 units in the previous month.

While the company has been concentrating on commercial vehicle sales with a 25% growth target. The company too had been buoyant in their outlook in terms of growth in sales for CV and Jaguar-Land Rover (JLR).

C Ramakrishnan, CFO of Tata Motors in an Autocar report said that growth in heavy commercial vehicles is expected to remain 'buoyant' thanks to the ensuing replacement demand as well as the need for fleet expansion.

Guenter Butschek, Managing Director of Tata Motors said that he expected to transform the brand in India with the launch of several new cars, Tata Tiago being the first in that list of transformational cars to launch. However, Tata Tiago sales have barely managed to grow by 8.8% in the second month of launch with 3,287 units in May 2016 from 3,022 units in the previous month.

While Butschek expects upcoming cars from Tata Motors like the Nixon, Kite 5 and Hexa to completely overhaul the company's place in the passenger vehicle market, there's still a long way for it to go.

At 1305 hours Tata Motors stock on BSE was trading down 3.60% or 16.45 points at Rs 440.75 per piece.

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