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Suzuki models, news & reviews
3
Handling
2
Performance
Usability
Feelgood factor
Readers' rating
2.5
By Ben Oliver
First Drives
20 October 2008 15:30
Less than a month after the new Suzuki Alto and Nissan Pixo twins were unveiled at the 2008 Paris motor show, CAR Online has been to Delhi to drive the Suzuki version. Why Delhi? This is where they’ll be built. Suzuki’s Indian subsidiary Maruti is easily the country’s biggest car maker, building more than 750,000 cars here each year and targeting a million by 2010. Almost all are currently for India’s booming domestic market, but successfully exporting this car to Europe is a big part of the growth plan. The big question is whether the quality of the new Suzuki Alto is up to European expectations.
Absolutely not: the Maruti bosses themselves say they fully expect to have to earn the trust of European buyers, in exactly the same way as the Japanese and Korean car makers did when they first started exporting. Unlike some of the Chinese makers, who offer hilarious, appalling-quality clones of Western cars in some European markets, the Alto is a properly designed and engineered city car with some impressive stats. They’ve done it once before, selling the Indian-made, last-generation Alto in Europe, but in very small numbers. And this car will be sold alongside Suzukis and Nissans built in Japan and Europe; there should be no perceptible difference in quality.
Click 'Next' below to read more of our Suzuki Alto first drive
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Batty says
RE: Suzuki Alto (2008) CAR review
Does anyone else think that Ben Oliver looks very similar to Dom Joly in the above photo, or is it just me?
23 October 2008 03:01
-Joe- says
I'm sorry but is that pink metal I can see on the inside. In this modern age should that really be on show in the vast majorities it is. And the rear seats its just not really good enough really. Don't get ne wrong I like sme Suzikis, like the Seift which I really want, but is so good its not depreicated enough for me when I need a cra.
21 October 2008 15:57
jacomoseven says
I'm surprised the packaging is so poor. It might be aimed at young drivers in Europe, but in India it will serve as family transport. I'm NOT surprised it undercuts the Aygo, which is a much more desirable, more polished car. This lacks the charm that all great small cars have.
21 October 2008 10:39
JohnSpencer says
@JohnnyBimmer - nowadays supercar launches are at least three days apart, so car blogs have to put *something* up on those slow news days in between. -- but kudos to Car for giving this roller skate headline treatment, while other Earth-shattering stories like the eagerly anticipated first driving impressions of the new Vauxhall Insignia are mysteriously relegated to a minor video list. Must be a nod to their "Small Car" origins in the 1960s -- which I hasten to add I do not remember myself.
21 October 2008 08:36
JohnnyBimmer says
It comes to something when CAR puts a Suzuki Alto as lead article on its webzine. I doubt they'd push with this shopping trolly on the hardcopy magazine to try and grab consumer sales on newsagents magazine shelves! And CAR rates this blockbuster a 3 star. It's a real sizzler isn't it? Is CAR treating its internet readers differently to those floating wallets in newsagents? How did we get a shocking pink shopping trolly to hold our attention and magazine readers get a Ferrari Calironia to grab theirs?
20 October 2008 23:14
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