Lexus bullish on Indian luxury market

Lexus, the luxury car brand of Japanese auto giant Toyota, which completed five years in India, the world’s fourth and Asia’s third biggest car market, is bullish on the luxury car market in the country, which is likely to touch 35,000-40,000 units this calendar year. India’s  rich and famous bought about four luxury cars every hour in the first nine months of this year, taking the volumes to over 25,000 units. Naveen Soni, president at Lexus India, in an interview with Michael Gonsalves, reveals the road map for the luxury car market and the Lexus brand in India.

How was the Diwali festival season for Lexus and the response to your latest model, Lexus NX 350h SUV?

It was a great Diwali sales season for Lexus across India. In fact, it was a high growth point for us as the book order was significantly higher and we were able to deliver the cars to our customers. The NX350h is a complete model update over the preceding variant and to be honest, the customer response has been overwhelming and beyond our expectations. We announced the bookings for the new vehicle in January 2022. Our discerning luxury consumers laid their trust in the brand even before learning about the price and the entire year’s volume got sold out in no time leading to a long wait time. We are consistently making all efforts to meet the delivery commitments given to our guests.

Has the luxury car market in India rebounded to get back to 40,000 units annually this year?

After a two-year hiatus, the luxury automobile industry is reviving. The market shrank by 50 per cent between 2020 and 2021. However, we anticipate the demand in the luxury auto industry to revive to its highest ever size of 40,340 units that we saw in 2018, even though sales may be marginally below the demand owing to the impact on supplies due to the geo-political situations and impact of Covid on availability of semiconductors. While we are very happy that the demand for luxury cars is seeing a rebound, there is a huge potential for further growth when we look at the contribution of luxury car volumes to the entire passenger car market, which currently stands at 1 per cent in India, while its 14 per cent in China. Also, to note the fact that China’s luxury car volume is at a similar level as that of the passenger car market size of India. Also, the number of high-net-worth individuals (HNIs) and ultra-HNIs in India are expected to grow faster than the global rate, implying that the future of the Indian luxury auto industry is very positive and encouraging.

You are known as the world’s largest hybrid luxury car maker. When do you plan to introduce pure electric cars in the country?

We are researching the market and feel that the future of transportation will be electrified rather than just electric, with all electrified technologies. Consumers should be able to choose the most suitable technology for themselves.