Hyundai Grand i10 waiting periods to be cut

Hyundai India has plans of boosting production at its Sriperumbudur manufacturing facility on the outskirts of Chennai. The production capacity increase at Hyundai’s Indian factory is likely to directly impact the waiting period of the Grand i10 hatchback, a runaway success for the South Korean car brand.

Introduced less than 2 months ago in India, the Grand i10 has managed to sell over 20,000 examples here. Hyundai is also sitting on a fat booking list that is swelling further with each passing week. With word-of-mouth getting viral, the demand for the made-for-India Grand i10 has been getting larger, leading to waiting periods to the tune of 2 months for certain variants.

Also read: Hyundai Grand i10 diesel road test and video review

To ensure that the Grand i10 is available with minimal waiting periods to customers interesting in buying this hatchback, Hyundai India plans to utilize the additional capacity it can squeeze out of its Sriperumbudur facility by means of engineering tweaks.  While the present capacity of the factory stands at 6.3 lakh cars/year, re-engineering it will boost capacity by another 50,000 units, to take the total capacity to 6.8 lakhs/year.

The additional capacity is likely to be mainly used for producing the Grand i10. Currently, Hyundai is using 99 % of its production capacity to cater to domestic and export demand. The South Korean car giant is one of the leading car exporters from India. Hyundai cars built in India are exported to both developing and developed markets around the world.

With Hyundai planning to expand the Grand i10’s range by adding automatic gearboxes to the petrol and diesel engined versions, the demand for this new Hyundai hatchback could further increase. So, the boost in production is a much needed step if Hyundai intends to avoid losing potential sales to customers put off by long waiting periods. While Hyundai hasn’t confirmed a time frame for the production increase, expect the re-engineering measures to be effected in the coming months.