The year 2016 ends on a high note for Nissan; redi-GO, redi-GO Sport lead sales pitch in December

Japanese carmaker Nissan has all the reasons to smile this New Year as the company posted a 21 percent increase in sales in the last month of 2016. Nissan reported domestic sales of 3,711 units in December 2016, as against 3,065 units sold during the same month a year ago.

Also read: Nissan, Datsun prices to be increased by up to Rs 30,000 from January 2017 

Additionally, for the first three quarters of fiscal year 2016, Nissan and Datsun's combined sales achieved an impressive 50 percent growth rate. The company attributed the growth to the redi-GO and redi-GO Sport, which continue to sustain momentum in the country.

Commenting on the sales results, Arun Malhotra, managing director, Nissan Motor India Pvt. Ltd., said, "Nissan India achieved healthy sales in December by posting 21 percent year-on-year growth despite the challenges of the demonetisation issue. This strong performance came on the back of continued success of Datsun redi-GO and the great customer response to the redi-GO SPORT."

Nissan, which hopes to attain 5 percent market share by 2020 in India, has already announced the intention to introduce up to eight new cars from the Datsun and Nissan brands to India by 2021. The year 2017 will see the arrival of the much-awaited X-Trail Hybrid.

Coming to the redi-GO, the small car has been driving the sales of Nissan in India since its launch in June. The redi-GO was later joined by the special edition — the redi-Go Sport — which boosted the sales further. The redi-Go Sport comes with additional features such as theme grille-red accents, theme wheel cover, graphics, roof spoiler, sporty dashboard, Bluetooth audio system, remote key-less entry and rear parking sensor.

Under the hood, the redi-Go gets a 799cc three-cylinder petrol motor that churns out 53bhp and a peak torque of 72Nm. The engine comes mated to a five-speed manual gearbox and claims to return a fuel efficiency of 25.17kmpl.

The prices of Nissan and Datsun vehicles in the country will become dearer by up to Rs 30,000 from January 2017. While Nissan India retails Micra, Micra Active, Sunny, Terrano and the iconic GT-R in the country, Datsun — the low-cost brand of the company — has the GO hatchback, GO+ MPV and redi-GO small car in its India portfolio.