This week in Auto: TVS launches Apache 310, Range Rover Velar debuts in India

Several key launches, especially in the premium and luxury space, dominated headlines this week. The mass market segment may be slowing down but manufacturers are ready to bet on the luxury and premium segments for fueling growth. Here’s a look at all the major developments in the automotive space over the past week:

Yamaha and Honda, two of the biggest Japanese players, debuted their superbikes – R1 and Goldwing respectively – in the Indian market to boost their presence in the growing segment of imported premium bikes.

Yamaha, the fifth biggest two-wheeler maker in India, launched its global flagship model, the 1000cc YZF-R1 priced at Rs 20.73 lakh. Honda introduced the 2018 version of the Goldwing, bookings for which have been opened by the Japanese company. At an ex-showroom price of Rs 26.85 lakh in Delhi, the Goldwing is Honda’s most expensive bike on sale in the country.

Land Rover announced the launch of the Range Rover Velar in India at Rs 78.83 lakh. Velar is the fourth model in the Range Rover family that sits between the Range Rover Evoque and Range Rover Sport.

The Velar is available in three powertrains; a 2.0 litre, 4-cylinder 132 kW diesel, a 2.0 litre 4-cylinder 184 kW petrol and a 3.0 litre  V6 221 kW diesel. Deliveries of the Velar will begin from January.

Chennai-headquartered two-wheeler maker TVS Motor Company launched the much-awaited Apache RR 310 at Rs 2.05 lakh to enter the super premium motorcycle segment. The bike is the most powerful built by TVS and shares features of the BMW 310GS, which is also made by TVS at its factory.

The company hopes to sell 10,000 units of the Apache RR 310 in the first year. The bike has a direct competitor in the Kawasaki Ninja 300 which is priced significantly higher at Rs 3.6 lakh. This is fifth model under production which bears the Apache brand.

Toyota Kirloskar Motors will hike prices by up to 3 percent from January. The company considered the price rise after reviewing input and freight costs periodically.

Frequent fluctuations in the global commodity prices and foreign exchange rates have impacted input costs on the domestic as well as import fronts, the company said in a statement.

TVS Motor, the maker of Apache bike and Jupiter scooter, picked up a 14.78 percent stake in Ulraviolette Automotive, a Bengaluru-based electric two-wheeler and energy infrastructure startup for slightly more than Rs 5 crore.

Ultraviolette Automotive was founded by Niraj Rajmohan (CEO) and Narayan Subramaniam (CTO) — alumni of BMS College of Engineering, Bengaluru — in December 2015 . TVS is independently developing electric vehicles and the first among such products, an electric scooter, will be launched next year.