News Tonight

With the intent of improving its well below-estimate sales of Tata Nano, a product ballyhooed as the cheapest car in the world, Tata Motors has recently released an upgraded and updated model of Nano. The reports were by the company on Monday that it is not entirely pleased by the sales of Nano.

Tata has roughly sold 130,000 units of Nano since the car made its debut way back in April 2009. The four-seater Nano costs no more than 140,000 INR ($2,730), and was developed with a motive of triggering the price war in Indian automobile sector. However, sales of Nano have not been promising at all and the underperformance has been haunting Tata Motors ever since the lack of sales against expectations was reported.

On the other hand, quite a few controversies surrounded Nano during its preliminary phase. Some of the troubles faced by Tata Motors regarding the development of Nano include a rise in input costs which forced the company to spike the price of Nano and later, it was caught in a land dispute at the original manufacturing unit of Nano. Due to the land dispute, Tata was forced to move its production unit to an alternative location.

Earlier in November, Tata gave Nano owners the choice to installing safety protection in their car following reports that seven Nano cars had caught fire, though the carmaker denied the situation being a recall, claiming that the fires were particular to the units.

In its latest statement, the company revealed that the modified Nano will showcase more fuel efficiency, an ultra-powerful engine along with subtle changes in interiors. Tata Motors is the third-largest carmaker in India, in terms of domestic sales.