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Hyundai will have the media preview of its new car AH2(codenamed) on 4th October. The company recently launched the Hyundai namkaran contest for its car. As per the reports Santro has emerged the most popular suffix. And why not, Santro has been the most successful car in Hyundai India’s portfolio. Santro had single handedly established Hyundai as a reputed OEM in the Indian landscape.
The 2018 Santro will be based upon old Hyundai i10 HA platform. The new car will sit between Hyundai Eon and Hyundai Grand i10. The Santro will be the company’s first product to feature an Automated Manual Transmission(AMT). Hyundai will market it as ‘Smart Auto’. The 2019 Hyundai AH2 will rival the likes of Renault Kwid, Maruti Celerio and the Tata Tiago. The Santro nameplate was really the gamechanger for Hyundai and it helped Hyundai to establish its foothold in India.
Lets have a look at the brief history and sales statistics of Hyundai Santro.
History
The Santro (also known as Atos and Amica) was the city car produced by Hyndai. The original Santro was introduced in the year 1997.Hyundai called it as ‘the sunshine car’.
Hyundai Santro is sold under different names in various regions
Hyundai Amica –United Kingdom
Dodge Atos –Mexico
Kia Visto- Indonesia and South Korea
Inokom Atos –Malaysia
Electric Version :-
Hyundai also unveiled an electric car based on the Santro, the Atos EV. The car has the range of 193 km and can reach a top speed of 130 km/h.
In Indian market Hyundai Santro was launched in the year 1998. It was produced at Hyundai’s plant in Chennai. Santro crossed around 100000 unit sales in 2000. It was selling around 30000 a year when Hyundai decided to stop its production in 2014.
The first gen Hyundai Santro was powered by 1.0 Epsilon 4 cylinder engine producing 61 bhp and 110Nm of torque.
Hyundai Santro 1998
The Santro got a mid life facelift in 1999 and was called Santro Zipdrive.
Hyundai Santro Zipdrive
In 2003 the car underwent a complete facelift and was named Santro Xing. The Santro Xing was powered by 1.1 l Epsilon 4 cylinder engine producing 65 bhp and 98Nm of torque. This model had a dream run for its full lifecycle until 2014 without any significant changes.
Hyundai Santro Xing
Finally Hyundai stopped its production inorder to accommodate newer models like Elite i20 in the assembly line.
Sales statistics of Hyundai Santro in India –
Santro’s volume trend in it’s 17 years existence in the Indian market
The erstwhile Santro had single handedly managed Hyundai’s volumes in India. In the first 10 years (i.e. 1998-2017); 76% of Hyundai India’s sales was contributed by Santro! (out of 11,40,116 Hyundai’s sold, 8,62,428 cars were Santro’s). Can the upcoming Santro work the same magic for Hyundai? Let’s wait and watch.
Sources: Hyundai India ,Wikipedia and IndianAutosBlog
(This article is written by Gourav Saksham, a dentist by profession and a Petrohead by passion. You can connect with him at gouravsaksham@gmail.com)