Maruti Suzuki, India's largest car maker, launched its first compact SUV the Vitara Brezza on March 8 2016. The compact SUV has become a runaway success for the Indo-Japanese brand in terms of bookings and sales. The vehicle has just crossed a milestone booking figure of 2 lakh within 11 months of its launch.
Also read: Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza wins Indian Car of the Year (ICOTY) 2017
Vitara Brezza was late to the party of compact SUVs in the country. It is also offered only in diesel mill, while its rivals such as Ford EcoSport and Mahindra TUV300 are offered in both petrol and diesel mills. Despite these factors, the Vitara Brezza took the segment by storm. It has an average monthly sale nearly 9,000 units, which it is forced to limit because of the capacity constraints at Maruti Suzuki plants.
Maruti Suzuki has sold nearly 2 lakh Vitara Brezza units since its launch in March 2016, making it one of India's top 10 selling passenger vehicle models. Even after nearly a year of launch, the demand for the compact SUV is still strong with a waiting period of up to seven months depending on the variant. Despite an increase in production of the compact SUV to 10,000 units from July, Maruti Suzuki is still struggling to meet the rising demand.
The Vitara Brezza also won the prestigious Indian Car of the Year (ICOTY) 2017 title in December battling it out against the Hyundai Tucson and Toyota Innova Crysta. It is Maruti Suzuki's first model to be fully developed in India by its R&D team led by CV Raman.
Vitara Brezza also pushed Maruti Suzuki's presence in the UV segment, which was not really its domain. Maruti Suzuki is the second highest UV-seller in India with 1,09,967 units sale during the first half of FY 2016-17. The company also registered 139 percent growth in UV sales against 46,068 units sold during the same period during April-October 2015.
Priced in the range of Rs 7.19 lakh to Rs 9.88 lakh (ex-showroom Delhi), the Vitara Brezza is powered by a 200 DDis 1248cc diesel engine that develops 88.5bhp at 4,000rpm and 200Nm of torque at 1,750rpm mated to a five-speed manual gearbox. It boasts a best-in-class fuel efficiency of 24.3 kmpl.
