Meanwhile, Nano a dream that turned sour

In March 2009, when Ratan Tata launched Nano, the 'people's car', everyone in India was so excited: the manufacturing ups and down from Singur (West Bengal) to Sanand (Gujarat) had gained a separate salience, though. The state of the car today is a sad story. As against an installed capacity of 2.5 lakh cars per annum, the Nano car factory in Sanand produced only 42,561 cars between January 2014 and December 2015. The sales had peaked in 2011-12 when 74,527 cars were sold.

In his email to the board of Tata Sons, Mistry has called for completely halting Nano production. “The Nano product development required concept called for a car below Rs1 lakh, but the cost was always above this. This product has consistently lost money, peaking at Rs 1,000 crore,” Mistry said in his letter. 

The Tata motors spokesperson refused to share Nano sales numbers saying “We cannot share any specific plans on Nano. Neither can we share product-wise sales figures.” 

The data accessed from the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers Association (SIAM) says the total Gen X Nano sales during April-September 2016 were 4,459 in the domestic market. While in fiscal year 2015-16, there were 21,012 units, whereas it sold 16,901 units in 2014-15. 

Originally set up at Singur in West Bengal, Nano plant was shifted to Sanand in Gujarat in October 2008 following violent protests over land acquisition at Singur. The small car's poor fortunes have had an impact on the Tata Motors' Sanand plant. Admitting that Nano has “wasted an early opportunity” due to teething problems, Ratan Tata said earlier Tata Motors will do everything to undo the tag of “poor man's car.” 

In order to revive the Nano brand and position it as a more up-market product, it launched refurbished avatar Gen x Nano in 2015, with smart features like automatic transmission, new instrument panel etc. In fact, the entire campaign designed for the car is to project it as a “smart city car”, thus getting away with the “cheap” tag that went against the brand in the past. 

GenX was the third avatar of Nano. In January 2014, the company had another makeover with Nano Twist. 

A Tata dealer said, “People have many options. For example Renault Kwid aggressively priced the hatchback at Rs 2.56 lakh, not much above GenX Nano's entry level price of Rs 1.99 lakh.”

Industry experts added that Nano failed as it could not meet the aspirations of the buyer in totality and not just because of one or two reasons.

Maruti Suzuki chairman, RC Bhargava says a buyer does not just look for a vehicle. “One has to meet the aspirations of a buyer in totality.”