As some of you may know, the Datsun brand is back and offering affordable vehicles in emerging markets to compete against other established brands. In India, the Datsun Go Supermini went on sale earlier this year and was priced at approximately $6,700. I was disappointed with the Go Supermini but after seeing what was just revealed for the Russian market, that Go Supermini is looking quite super right about now.
The poor Russians got a first taste of the new Datsun with the unveiling of the Datsun on-DO. I was thinking that Datsun “on-DON’T” might be a better fit for this four-door, five-seater family sedan. According to the company, the name is a combination of Russian and Japanese. The Russian word ‘ON’ stands for ‘he’ which “underlines the car’s strength, performance, and masculinity” while the Japanese word ‘Do’ means ‘way’ and ‘moving’.
I don’t see much masculinity in those lines but the front of the vehicle is just “okay” while the side profile and rear view are quite terrible in my opinion. The Datsun on-DO will be built in Russia alongside the Lada Granta which actually looks quite similar to this Datsun. In terms of size, this five-seat model is 4,337mm (170.75-inches) long, 1,700mm (66.93-inches) wide, and 1,500mm (59.06-inches) tall.
The Datsun on-DO comes equipped with a 1.6-liter gasoline engine which produces 87 horsepower. Not a whole lot of power but it should get some pretty decent fuel economy out of the small motor. The vehicle pricing is to start at 400,000 Russian Rubles which works out to approximately $11,232 at today’s exchange rate. The car will go on sale in the summer of 2014 with 25 fully-branded dealerships and will be joined by an additional 75 outlets by end of 2016.
I’m just curious why vehicles in emerging markets have to be on the unattractive side? For this “brand new company” to offer their very first vehicle in Russia and come up with this design is a back-slap to the face. You can have an affordable vehicle and still be decent looking. Although I’m being harsh on it, the Datsun on-DO does appear to have a few nice option for this segment. It has power locks, windows, heated front seats, an SD card reader, and a USB port. There is also a bit of hands-free technology and you can answer/decline phone calls while on the go.
Overall, the price and features are a good value but the design team needs to step it up a little bit. An emerging market deserves the same quality of vehicles as any other place in the world.
[Via: Datsun]
