M&M to increase prices by 0.5-1.5% soon

Hike to be taken into account due to high commodity prices, other costs

Utility and commercial vehicle manufacturer Mahindra & Mahindra today announced plans of carrying out a price hike in the range of 0.5-1.5% across its entire portfolio in the coming days.

The hike will be taken on account of increase in commodity prices and other costs said a senior executive of the company. M&M joins the band of car making companies such as Maruti Suzuki, Renault, General Motors and Honda who have already made similar price hike announcements recently.

Pravin Shah, chief executive (automotive division), M&M said, "We would be taking a price hike on all our products in the next few days. This is done to take care of the hike in commodity prices and other general increase in other costs. The quantum of the hike is still to be finalised. Only after understanding the implication of the increase in input costs will we pass on the increase to customers".

While Honda has said that it will charge customers 0.2-2.6% more from today on the City, Brio and Jazz, Maruti and GM are yet to take a call on the quantum of hike and the date of enforcing it.

Shah also stated that the company has undertaken bookings of 14,000 units of the premium sport utility vehicle XUV500 while more than 35,000 units of the vehicle are already on the road.

"XUV500 has a waiting period of 6-15 weeks depending on the market, while the Quanto has taken bookings of 3,200 units since its launch and has performed according to our expectations", added Shah.

The Mumbai-based company saw an increase of 22% in passenger vehicle domestic volumes in September to 23,808 units as against 19,447 units sold in the same month last year.

The company with a 99% diesel line-up also said that there has been very little impact of the recent hike in diesel prices of Rs 5/litre as it was an expected move by the government.