In the US, a lot of new Chinese and Indian automobiles are set to launch and make their debut in the ensuing months. New reports suggest that not many Americans are considering buying cars from Indian car makers like Mahindra, Tata and BYD.
Barometer of Automotive Awareness and Imagery study, a market research from GfK Automotive firm, have found out that Indian and Chinese car makers could face similar blues when it comes to purchase of cars in the US like when Korean automobiles were launched in US.
The study says it took 15 years or perhaps more for general consumers to really consider purchasing Korean vehicles.
The study says a lot of Americans are either not open or hesitate to buy cars from an Indian or a Chinese car manufacturer. It says auto makers that try to enter the US market face touch challenges in brand acceptance and awareness.
The BAAIS (Barometer of Automotive Awareness and Imagery Study) says they found only 38% of the consumers consider buying a car from China and 30% would consider buying an Indian automobile.
In retrospect, about 95% would consider buying cars from an American manufacturer, 76% from German manufacturers, 75% from Japanese manufacturers and 49% would consider going for a Korean vehicle.
Consumers from GenY would go for Indian or Chinese automobiles with about 52% expressing their thoughts on going for a Chinese car and 41% were open to buying cars from India.
The study says Baby Boomers were interested the least among all. The GfK report feared Indian and Chinese cars would face similar blues like Hyundai initially did when it struggled to gain acceptance in American markets.
GfK further cited that quality, safety, reliability and performance are the key factors that Americans look into when going for a car and Hyundai did initially trail in all these factors and perception did take years to change just because Korean manufacturers themselves took nearly 15 years for offering competitive products.
Automobile manufacturers like Chery (China), Mahindra (India) and BYD (China) have declared their interests to get into the American market and are repeatedly delaying their introduction.
GfK further elaborated that only time could tell when these cars would make it to the American shores and feels the time is right now as the present parent company is Tata for Jaguar and Land Rover and Chinese-based firm Geely are the owners of Volvo.