Honda has
removed Mobilio from its official website in India indicating that it is going to stop the production of this van. No official announcement regarding its removal or reasons thereof have been made yet by Honda.
The
Mobilio was launched in July 2014. It was meant to compete with likes of Maruti
Suzuki Ertiga. However, it was built on the Brio platform and Honda did
some apparent cost cutting that spoilt the MPV's overall package. It was a product looking poor from every angle, from a famous company like Honda. The
dashboard was a copy of one in Brio hatchback. As a result,
it never managed to find a dedicated target audience in the Indian
market. Monthly sales were poor, near the 100 unit mark, which wasn't
enough to have a separate product in the portfolio.
Moreover, when
Honda launched BR-V crossover in India, Mobilio became a
redundant offering. The BR-V came at a similar price tag, was built on
the same platform, but didn't suffer from any significant cost cutting
issues. Moreover, thanks to its SUV-like face, the BR-V looked visually
more appealing than the Mobilio. It also came with an updated dashboard.
This further hit the Mobilio's sales and Honda appears to have finally
got rid of the slow-selling MPV in India.
It is also worth noting
that Honda has already introduced a mid-life facelift of the Mobilio in
Indonesia. However, the updated model is unlikely to make it to India,
owing to the low popularity of the Mobilio in our market.
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