Nissan India unveils compact SUV Terrano

Nissan Terrano

The Indian arm of Japanese carmaker Nissan on Tuesday unveiled a compact sports utility vehicle (SUV), dubbed Terrano, which aims to take on rivals like the Ford EcoSport and the Renault Duster.

Priced below Rs10 lakh, the Terrano is Nissan Motor India’s latest effort to grow its Indian market share by taking advantage of growing demand for compact SUVs.

The car manufacturer aims to grab a market share of 10 per cent by the year of 2016, up from 1.8 per cent from the financial year of 2012-13.

Nissan India President Kenichiro Yomura said, “There is competition everywhere, even in SUVs and sedan. So we have intentionally made Terrano premium. We are targeting the premium side of the compact SUV segment.”

Nissan has priced Terrano higher than its partner Renault’s Duster SUV so that the launch of the new SUV would not hurt the sales Duster, but analysts are of the view that Terrano will do have some cannibalizing effect on duster.

Puneet Gupta, an associate director at IHS Automotive, estimated that the launch of Terrano might bring Renault Duster’s sales down by some 1,000 units.

Terrano will officially be launched in October this year, with pre-bookings scheduled to start in September.