Honda small car for India to take 3 years

Emerging economies including India will have their first taste of Honda’s small car in the next three years time. With this, Honda will join the likes of car makers who are fast readying their small cars.

Confirming this, Chief Executive Takeo Fukui has said that Honda Motor Co would develop the entry-level car below the Fit model to meet demand in emerging economies.  In the meantime, the car ginat is also expected to delay the introduction of medium to large-sized diesel models in the United States and Japan. Such a move has come about in its bid to focus more on on hybrid and small cars even as the industry is fighting to stay afloat as the global economic slump goes from bad to worse day after day.

Honda is expected to launch a five-seater small car, and the buzz is that the real small car from the Japanese major would debut in India soon. Earlier reports had pointed out that Honda would launch the small car in Europe as well as emerging countries such as China and India by early 2010.

The small car was being tipped as smaller than the smallest version of the Fit and is expected to come with an engine displacement of less than a litre. This in reality is less than the 1.3 litre engine sported by the smallest version of the Fit subcompact series, said industry sources.

The car would be designed by a research team in Japan. It is also being said that  India is readying itself for he production of the Honda small car on its soil. The Honda small car which will debut in India would be initially rolled out from a plant in north India.

Among the other various players who are making their small cars is General Motors who is said to be eyeing design inputs from India for its edition of the small car. The GM small car would most probably be rolled out by the second half of year 2009.

Honda currently has several successful models in India such as the new Honda City, Honda Civic and Accord. The company’s drastic price cut on the Honda Civic hybrid model had recently seen huge demand.