With the rise in popularity of automatics in India, Mahindra will be launching the XUV500 automatic in our country next year and will later give the new unit to the Scorpio as well.
Mahindra has found the right formula to make the perfect mixture of products in India. The company retails utility vehicles that have been spread across evenly in the market, with each of them finding large number of customers respectively. Though Mahindra vehicles are more favored in the rural parts of the country, the company has done well to change this very image with the updated Scorpio and XUV500. The Bolero is soon going to be updated as well to attract to a wider audience base.
Popularity of automatic vehicles are on the rise in the country because of increasing traffic across India. Mahindra does not retail any of the aforementioned models with an automatic gearbox other than the recently launched Scorpio automatic. However, the company is reportedly working on bringing a new automatic gearbox from Aisin. The new Aisin six-speed automatic transmission has been newly developed (called the ‘Version 4’) and is an improved unit of the current 6-speed TF-80SC unit that is found on vehicles like the Volvo S80, Cadillac SRX and the Peugeot 508 internationally.
This new automatic gearbox will be launched first on the more premium XUV500 SUV next year and will later find its way to the Scorpio automatic as well, which is currently served by an improved 6-speed transmission from DSI of Australia. Anyhow, the new Aisin autobox is expected to help the XUV500 and Scorpio automatic variants to perform well in the Indian car market and help these vehicles find more buyers come next year. The XUV500 automatic is expected to be priced at a premium of Rs. 1 lakh over the manual variants and Mahindra is expected to offer the automatic gearbox in both 2WD and 4WD avatars, like the Scorpio automatic. The Scorpio automatic will be offered with the new automatic gearbox after the XUV500 and should not demand a premium as compared to current prices.
Source – AutocarIndia.com