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Nissan Motor India is planning to launch its sports car 370Z in India by January 2010. The company has drawn up an aggressive plan for India which will see a business model comprising five locally-made cars and four imported models by 2012.

The company considers India as one of the key market and expects to sell 300-odd units of its Teana and X-trail models, which have already been launched in the Indian market.

It has appointed Hover Automotive India as its service partner for marketing, sales, after-sales service and dealer development in the country.

Under the service provision agreement, Hover will undertake the implementation of Nissan’s marketing and sales strategy and support dealer development in India.

Speaking to Business Standard, Hover Automotive India Vice-Chairman G M Singh said: “We are planning to launch the sports car 370Z in India by January 2010. Although, the market size for sports car is small, the demand will definitely increase in the near future and we are bullish on it.”

He added Nissan is already investing close to $1.4 billion for setting up a manufacturing facility in Chennai, having an initial installed capacity of 200,000 units per annum and which can be upgraded to 400,000 units per annum.

The new plant is likely to be operational in the first half of 2010.

The company has plans to launch its hatchback car Micra also in first half of 2010. Singh added, “Micra will be built on new platform and we will launch the car by the end of June 2010.”

It has also plans to export Micra to Europe and 100 other countries.

Nissan India, which already imports the X-Trail SUV and the Teana sedan as CBUs (completely built-up units), plans to sell over 300-odd units of these cars.

On the supplier front, he added that the company has plans to source 70-80 per cent of the components locally over a period of time.

“We have already opened seven dealerships across India and plan to take the number up to 18 by the end of this financial year,” Singh said.