India’s Tata Motors Monday announced it would begin delivery of the Nano, billed as the world’s "cheapest car", in July.
The four-door Nano is currently being built in “limited numbers” at a company plant in the north Indian hill state of Uttrakhand. Tata Motors, however, aims to make 350,000 Nanos a year from 2010 at another unit elsewhere in the country, a company statement said. “It is to the credit of the team at Tata Motors that a car once thought impossible by the world is now a reality. I hope it will provide safe, affordable, four-wheel transportation to families who till now have not been able to own a car. We are delighted in presenting the Tata Nano to India and the world,” company chief Ratan Tata told a news conference in Mumbai to announce the “commercial launch” of the $2,000 car. Watch more on the Nano » Tata Motors said the Nano would initially be available through bookings or reservations filed on a request form priced around $6, or Rs 300. Tata will accept the bookings from April 9 to April 25.
Within 60 days of the closure of bookings, Tata Motors will process and announce the allotment of 100,000 cars in the first phase of deliveries, through a computerized random selection procedure, it added. “Deliveries will commence from July 2009,” said the company statement.
