Product Marketing In Automobile Industry

3.1 Subject Area

Product marketing is the voice of the customer to any organization and addresses four important strategic questions for any business,

• What are the products to be offered?

• Who are the target customers (i.e., market segments to be served)?

• The distribution channel?

• Price the products be offered?

3.2 Project proposal

The latest policy initiative of the Indian Government “Make in India” is a step in the right direction for the Indian Automobile Manufacturing Industry that contributes significantly to the country’s GDP. The policy will encourage Automobile manufacturers to introduce latest technology products that would be more or less common for both domestic and export market thus leveraging economies of scale. The initiative

We will be focusing more on buses for public transportation (12.1 to 16.2 T) and coaches.

3.3 Motivation for this subject area choice

We as individuals have travelled to cities in India and have taken some form of public transportation (buses) to reach places. The burgeoning population in urban areas has resulted in more passenger cars and 2-wheelers being added to the roads thus increasing congestion. On analysis and casual interaction with local citizens, we could gather that lack of good reliable buses coupled with high ticket fares were the main concerns for 2-wheeler and passenger car travelers not to shift to public transport i.e. buses. It was faster to travel by private modes rather than public transport.

Rapid urbanization has generated equivalent increase in the demand for travel as seen in the sharp rise in ownership of private vehicles. Transport infrastructure development has not kept pace with the increase in travel demand. In addition, the share of public transport vehicles has also declined in the same

Our motivation is to create a proposal that is practical and can be used as a referral document by bus manufacturers while entering the Indian bus and coach market. We would like to try to revolutionize public transport in Indian metros and cities by deriving features etc that help in introducing safe, efficient and eco-friendly buses to ordinary commuters

3.4 Research question

The methodology is associated with the core research question as follows:-

• What is the landscape of the M&HCV bus market in India for City buses and Coaches?

• Identify market potential for city buses and coaches till 2020.

• Understand traveler needs and operator requirement & identify gaps in existing offering.

• Formulate product features and target price band for new launches.

3.5 Project Title and key words

Analysis of the Passenger Commercial vehicles market in India and formulate a market entry strategy for a bus manufacturer to enter into both city and coach