Jeep has entered India with a long term strategy and it includes the volume game. After the Compass, it will be the all-new Renegade that will be built in India, followed by a third car, probably coded as 526. From what we could find out, it seems that the third Jeep might turn out to be a four-metre car, rivalling the likes of the Ford Ecosport and the Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza.
2017 is the year of the Compass and it seems that Jeep has successfully implemented the top-down approach for the Indian market. Coming in after the big-ticket Jeep Grand Cherokee and the Wrangler, the Compass with its Rs 15.5 lakhs to Rs 22 lakhs price tag has garnered over 3,000 bookings, a fairly large number for the premium compact SUV segment. The production has already begun and FCA is aiming at about 80,000 to 1 lakh units per annum including exports to the right-hand drive markets.
Next in line is the Jeep Renegade, prototypes of which have already been spotted many times in India. Slightly smaller than the Compass, the Renegade will compete with the Hyundai Creta and its ilk. Jeep might most probably price the Renegade beginning at about Rs 11 lakh, as a premium option for the compact crossover SUVs.
Jeep’s third India-built product is most probably a compact crossover, the one that will bring numbers. It is said that the new crossover will be even smaller than the Renegade and will mark the beginning of the Jeep scheme of things in India. The Compass and the Renegade are both being built on the Fiat 500X platform but we think that the platform might be too expensive to build a sub-four metre compact SUV. In that case, the new Jeep in the works might spawn off the Fiat Argo platform, which is an evolution of the current Punto platform which is already being built in India.
With Jeep taking centre-stage for FCA, it looks like Fiat as a brand in India is reaching the end of its road. With no new products in the pipeline, Fiat may exit the Indian market for good making way for expansion of the Jeep portfolio.
