Toyota have been the pioneers of the luxury MPV concept in India and have been able to sell us what is essentially a luxury minivan something no manufacturer has been able to do successfully.Now that we are used to this concept would be accept something like the Hyundai i800 which is a true blue van.
The i800 is aimed at the premium segment and retails for about Rs.15lakhs in the UK but hyundai have talked about introducing a cheaper version and with a made in India tag we could have a vehicle which could be priced closer to the Toyota innova.
It comes with a 2.5L crdi engine with FE similar to the innova but as it stands the power is way ahead of the innova offering 170bhp and 392Nm of torque.There is more than adequate space for eight and luggage.
Exterior dimensions are more bus like and don't expect to zip through traffic.Also no matter how hard Hyundai have tried people just are not ready to accept hyundai as a premium brand so anything priced above the Toyota innova would be hard to sell.The biggest drawback however could be its looks ,we like our utility vehicles to be as van like as possible in everything except looks.[image source:motoring.co.za]
