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Piaggio Vehicles, the Pune-based scooter and light commercial vehicle manufacturer, is entering the city three wheeler market with its new product Ape City, to challenge market leader Bajaj Auto.
The subsidiary of Italian Piaggio & C s.p.a has launched the new class of city-centric passenger three wheelers under the Ape City brand. The company is aiming to upset Bajaj Auto's dominance in the three wheeler segment.
The city three-wheeler market, whose sales are dictated by state governments based on the number of permits issued for most centers, is about 150,000 units per year. Piaggio is aiming to have 15-20% market share in this segment by end of this calendar year.
The Ape City costs Rs 1.10 lakh for petrol, Rs 1.23 lakh for LPG and Rs 1.25 lakh for CNG (ex-Maharashtra). Piaggio presently has a market share of 31% in the passenger three wheeler space while Bajaj Auto leads with a share of 50%.
Other players in the passenger segment includes Mahindra & Mahindra, Atul Auto, TVS Motors and Scooters India. The segment has grown by 9% to 370,868 units during the period April-January this year as against 340,032 units sold same period last year.
Ravi Chopra, chairman and managing director, Piaggio Vehicle said, "We were not present in the market segment which required alternate fuels like petrol, CNG and LPG. So we developed a compact fuel-efficient three wheeler for urban passenger movement." Many city regulations require three wheelers to be powered by cleaner fuels like CNG or LPG.
The three-wheelers will be built at the company's manufacturing plant in Baramati, Maharashtra which has an installed capacity of over 250,000 for three-wheelers.
Bajaj Auto sales in this segment rose to 186,420 units, a growth of 15% in the reported period as against 162,062 units sold in the same segment last year. While Piaggio reported a growth of four% at 110,943 units.
The total three wheeler sales (goods and passenger) in the April-January period stood at 450,645 units, an increase of five% as compared to 428,764 units sold in the same period last year.
Bajaj remains the market leader in the total domestic three-wheeler segment with a share of 42% followed by Piaggio with a share of 34%. Mumbai-based M&M remains the third biggest player in the segment with a share of 12%.
Piaggio is also targeting the export market with this new product with at least 50,000 units in the next 18-20 months. The export segment is about 300,000 units per year presently with the company hoping to begin shipments to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Africa and Latin America in the next few months.
