Mahindra S201 compact SUV to rival Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza in India
Mahindra and Mahindra has been working on new-gen SUVs for India that will be positioned at different segments. One of them is being developed under the codename S201 (that happens to the platform name as well). The S201 platform is expected to underpin two new SUVs. The larger SUV will battle it out with the likes of the Hyundai Creta and the Renault Captur. Whereas the compact SUV, that is believed to be a sub-4m offering will primarily battle it out with the Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza, Tata Nexon and the Ford EcoSport in India.
The Mahindra S201 SUVs have been doing testing rounds at different parts of the country. And now fresh set of images of test mules have been spotted in India, making us believe that it is not too long before we get to see the production version SUVs. In some cases, they have also been spotted with SsangYong Tivoli, that is also based on the S201 platform, which was also speculated to enter the country at some point in time. We believe bringing the SsangYong Tivoli would have been an expensive options, so Mahindra has decided to bring its own version to make it more affordable. It will be manufactured at the company's plant in Chakan.
The development of S201 will take place at the Mahindra Research Valley in Chennai. This centre has played a key role in the new iterations of the Mahindra XUV500, Scorpio, TUV300, KUV100 as well as the Imperio. The upcoming S201 SUV will be available in both petrol and diesel engines. More importantly, it will make use of a new-gen 1.5-litre and 1.6-litre petrol motors that is being jointly developed by SsangYong and Mahindra. The company has three design houses, namely Pininfarina, SsangYong and its in-house design facility. And we believe the S201 will be an amalgamation of insights from Pininfarina and the company's own facility. It will come with a totally fresh cabin design with premium appeal.
We expect Mahindra to showcase the S201 based SUVs along with the U321 MPV and the TUV300 Plus to make a debut at the Auto Expo 2018.
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