Over the past few years there have been many occasions where Renault and Nissan tried to form a joint alliance with India’s two-wheelers bigwig Bajaj and succeeded to a great extent. There were talks of an ultra-low car project that was to be carried out between Renault-Nissan in alliance with Bajaj but no this thing has gone haywire and the possibility of this initiative taking shape is seen to be bleak due to some circumstances.
The reason that is being speculated over the breaking of alliance is that the respective companies failed to come up to a justified agreement for alliance in making the Ultra Low Cost (ULC) car project a success. There were certain flaws in the agreement terms which were not in par with the demands of the companies and thus there was disagreement from all sides. As a result the deal had to be hung over and has been severed as the companies could not come up to a mutual agreement over the terms and conditions specified by each company.
Few years back there was speculation that Renault-Nissan had developed an interest in India’s leading two-wheeler maker Bajaj’s Ultra Low Cost (ULC) Car Project and had also given assurances to Bajaj about presenting a demo model of the car upon which the deal will be made between the three companies and all would come up to a common alliance.
Last month Bajaj unveiled its first model Bajaj RE60 of the ULC Car project at the 11th Auto Expo but the car did not appeal the Renault-Nissan representatives and since then there have not been any response from Renault-Nissan over the deal. Most probably the designing or the ergonomics of the car did not strike a chord with the representatives upon which they remained in dark over the reviews of the car.
Renault-Nissan were probably expecting a lot from Bajaj as they wanted a car which can compete with the likes of Tata Nano but RE60 was something that they were not looking for thus they decided not to put any money on the car.
The launch of Bajaj RE60 was very much anticipated by the Indian crowd as Bajaj had promised them a car which can match up to the buzz that was generated when Tata unveiled Nano in Auto Expo 2010. But the reputation of Bajaj took a beating when the response to the car which it was expecting was not met and it did not appeal Renault-Nissan when they came to have a glimpse of it. Once the car was unveiled at the Auto Expo 2012, Bajaj countered the response saying that RE60 was not meant to be a car but instead it was an upgraded model of a rickshaw which was powered by a 200 DTSi engine that is being used in Bajaj Pulsar and the mileage it is expected to give is a humble 35kmpl.
Thus in the coming time Bajaj can probably renegotiate the deal with Renault-Nissan.