PUNE: Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), the Tata Motors-owned British luxury marquee, on Thursday launched the heavily refreshed Land Rover Discovery Sport SUV to boost sales in a depressed economy.
JLR is the only luxury car brand to record growth in India in 2019. Its sales last year grew 9 per cent at 5,000 cars in India compared to 4,596 units in 2018 to beat Audi and become the third largest after Mercedes-Benz and BMW.
All luxury carmakers in India recorded de-growth last year. Market leader Mercedes' sales fell 11 per cent to 13,786 units in 2019, BMW's sales dropped by 13 per cent at 9,641 units, Audi's 29 per cent to 4,594 units and Volvo Cars' 15 per cent to 2,253 units.
The second-generation Discovery Sport, which made its global debut in May 2019, is offered in two variants—S and R—Dynamic SE at Rs 57.06 lakh and Rs 60.89 lakh respectively at pan India showroom.
In India, the new SUV competes with BMW X3, Mercedes-Benz GLC, Audi Q5 and Volvo XC60.
Built on the Evoque Transverse Archi-tecture, which makes it ready for shift to electric power in the future, the new Discovery Sport comes with BS-6-compliant 2.0-litre petrol and diesel Ingenium engines.
A nine-speed automatic unit handles transmission duties inside the Discovery Sport 2020 .
What is special in the new car is that it now comes with mild hybrid option which allows the Discovery Sport to cruise at speeds under 18 kmph with the engine off.
