GM India was dormant in 2011. The company had no new launches to show. Sure, it presented the Beat Diesel/Electric/CNG and the Smartech engine but these are categorized as variants or upgrades. When it came to new models, Chevrolet was pretty much in ‘consolidation phase’.
However, Chevrolet is making super plans for 2012. Apart from the Beat and Spark, they have no mass market products in their portfolio. Their people mover Tavera was banished from the metro cities due to lack of BSIV compliance. So a facelifted Tavera is in the making which will use engines from ICML. Another people mover – Hong Guang MPV is expected to lock horns with the Maruti Suzuki Ertiga, while the smaller diesel-engined HongTu is the Maruti Eeco's nightmare.
However the MOST important segment in the Indian automotive scene is the B and C segments. Chevrolet’s existing contenders - the Aveo and Aveo U-VA went to high school with Stonehenge. Their replacement is coming in the form of the Sail twins.
The hatchback version of the Sail was spotted by a Team-BHP member with the handle siddhu_engg24 testing near Nashik. The Sail hatchback is powered by a 1.2L petrol engine and a 1.3L Smartech diesel to directly compete against Indica Vista, Maruti Swift and Volkswagen Polo.
The sedan version of the Sail was spotted first by IAB in a parking lot. It will go head to head with the Fiesta Classic, Maruti Dzire, Tata Manza et al.
However, Chevrolet has not opted to bring the Sonic twins to India as planned earlier. GM's original plan was to land the Sonic sedan in early-to-mid 2011.
Do you think that the Sail twins will have a fighting chance against competition?
Source: TeamBHP.com
