Chennai Have It? "Later" Says Mahindra

India manufacturer Mahinda & Mahindra is delaying its entry into the U.S. market until the fourth quarter of 2009. Initially the companies diesel pickups were to begin rattling into dealerships in the spring of '09. Why the fuss, Gus? Mahindra wants rack up 3.2 million road miles on a fleet of 25 trucks here in the U.S. before releasing any vehicles to customers. Makes a lot of sense to me. Mahindra also took their product to J.D. Power to see what else might need fixin' and it came away with a laundry look of "honey do's" including: different seats and headliners, more cupholders, redesign the front console, a larger glove box, a better "thunk" sound when closing the doors and a grille that is "less sad."

Mahindra sees no problems meeting 50 state emissions requirements for its diesel engine and hopes to have 450 dealers signed up by the end of 2009. I look forward to a scrappy little diesel truck just like a was pumped about the stillborn Crosslander project (which was also from Mahindra's U.S. distributor Global Vehicles).

source: automotive news