Maruti Aims Big in A3 Plus Segment With Ciaz

Kolkata: Maruti Suzuki India, the country's largest carmaker, is aiming big with Ciaz in the A3 plus segment which replaces its SX4 sedan.

"We had done extremely good in A3 minus segment with Swift and Dzire and we want to do the same in the A3 plus segment with Ciaz," Maruti executive director (marketing and sales) R S Kalsi said at the launch of the new mid-sized sedan in the city last evening.

The current market in A3 plus segment is about 1.25 lakh units out of 5 lakh in entire A3 segment, which is 20 per cent of the 25 lakh car market, he said.

He further said that the Ciaz is expected to help A3 plus segment expand.

Maruti announced 10,000 pre-bookings for Ciaz, 60 per cent of which were for diesel models.

Ciaz is being produced at Maruti's Manesar plant and is aiming at a business of 60,000-80,000 units in the first year.

Mr Kalsi also said he was also banking on the 1.5 million customers of Swift and Dzire upgrading to Ciaz.

T Hashimoto, executive director-sales and marketing at Maruti, confirmed that the company had stopped SX4 production that was launched about seven years ago. Ciaz is an improved product to compete in the market, he added.