Hyundai’s fluidic design philosophy has been gaining popularity like a jungle fire and it is bringing new cars based on the fluidic design philosophy and updating the existing ones with it. Hyundai has a very niche offering in the form of Hyundai Santa Fe in the luxury SUV segment and the car got fluidic treatment a while ago but the Indian market has not played host to the car as yet. But all that is set to change as Hyundai intends on launching the Fluidic Santa Fe in India in the later half of the year 2013. We previously reported that it has already been launched in China.
The 2013 Santa Fe comes in 2 body variants are the 5 seater and 7 seater variants with the wheelbases standing at 4,689 mm and 4905 mm respectively. We believe that the 7 seater version is what we would be getting as people prefer a 7 seater SUV when they are going to spend a sum of around Rs.20 to 25 lakhs on a SUV. It will compete with the likes of the Toyota Fortuner, SsangYong Rexton, 2013 Honda CR-V and to ensure it does not get left behind in the kit department, the Santa Fe will get a power tailgate, a panoramic sunroof and proximity key to make it a more compelling buy than the competition.
On the insides, it will get the company’s Blue Link Connectivity System coupled with a 10 speaker Dimension audio system which comes with an 8 inch touchscreen for navigation and doubles up as the screen to the rear view camera. The heart of the SUV will be the 2.2 litre CRDi diesel motor which currently does duty in the Indian spec Santa Fe but would slightly tweaked to keep in sync with the upgradation of the car. The suspension gets updated and now gets an independent suspension unit which would ensure you get a better ride quality than the existing model.
The Koreans will manufacture the car in India instead of following the CBU route to keep the prices competitive and they might just opt for an increased localization in the production of the car to compete on the price frontier as well with the segment leader Toyota Fortuner. SUVs come and go but the Fortuner continues to be segment leader. The SsangYong Rexton is managing to take away some buyers away from the Fortuner and we expect the fluidic Santa Fe to take away the buyers from both these SUVs. And yes, from the Endeavour as well.
Also read- 2013 Santa Fe Spied Testing In India
Source: GOW
