Abstract

This case is about South Korean automaker Hyundai Motor Company’s Indian subsidiary, Hyundai Motor India Limited (HMIL), and the strategies it followed to emerge as the second biggest automobile manufacturer in India. HMIL entered the Indian market when the Indian automobile market was thrown open to foreign players in the 1990s. It quickly grew to become a leading player in the market. HMIL followed a strategy whereby it introduced feature rich and stylishly designed models for a reasonable price in the Indian market. This made its products appealing to upper middle class Indians who had had little choice other than the blandly designed models offered by the market leader Maruti Suzuki. HMIL slowly started to emerge as a leader in many high end automobile segments with the launch of models like the Fluidic Verna and the Elantra. Its unique Fluidic Sculpture design which was inspired by nature gave HMIL’s cars an upper class image. HMIL also started to focus on emerging as the leader in the low end of the market with the launch of products like the Eon. It leveraged heavily on social media which was highly used by younger customers and even released a service app for attracting the attention of this segment of customers. Despite its successes, HMIL was still lagging in some areas like SUVs, MUVs, and small cars. The downturn in the Indian economy and the introduction of new models by competitors in segments where HMIL did not have any presence had slightly decreased the market share of HMIL by the year 2013. But HMIL was optimistic about its market position in India and planned to introduce more new models to consolidate its position in the market.

Learning Objectives

The case is structured to achieve the following Learning Objectives:

• Understand the issues and challenges faced by companies when operating in foreign markets with different consumer tastes and preferences.
• Analyze the strategies that need to be followed by market challengers in attacking the leading players in the market (frontal, flank, encirclement, bypass, and guerilla).
• Analyze Hyundai’s competitive strategy in India.
• Discuss and debate whether HMIL will be able to maintain its position as the second biggest automobile manufacturer in India.
• Suggest the strategies that HMIL should follow in future to face the competition from other players who have been increasing their market share.

Keywords

Strategic Marketing, Market Leader strategies, Market Challenger strategies, Able challenger, International Marketing, Business strategy, Competitive strategy, Emerging markets strategy, Competition, Customer service, India, Indian automobile industry, Hyundai