It has only been a few years since we introduced our vision of a low-budget-car in BriefLetter, based on the consideration that it is going to become a financial necessity for more and more people to have a car that is secure, affordable and gets one from A to B in the appropriate amount of time also at times or locations, when there is no public transportation available.

At the time we thought that such a car should cost no more than 5,000 Euro in Germany, in a Second World country no more than 3,000 Euro. Spokespeople of the automotive industry, associations and representatives of other industries and organizations defined our considerations as unrealistic and they were flatly discounted.

Market researchers categorized the sales prospect for such a cheap car as very low. We felt this would be the case for a cheap car, but not for an economical car and thus we spoke of our vision with our friends at TATA in India. To be honest, even in India they were at first not really hooked on the idea. Even in India they saw a car more in the segment where the wants of people are situated and less in the segment where we find everything that satisfies the needs of people. Even though globally, hundred of millions of people would get a chance to find work, if they had the ability to manage distances at much lower costs. Even though energy costs, taxes and expenditures for insurance coverage, maintenance and accommodation devour more and more money and traffic conditions barely allow for joyful rides, nobody really wanted to believe that our vision would become reality one day, against all odds.

For the longest time this topic seemed to be done, even in India, until Renault let the European automotive industry prick its ears with its low price car built in Romania. The success Renault announced after a very short time, mobilized. Renault wants to sell one million Dacia Logan till 2009. Today, all automotive manufacturers in the world work on their own version of a low priced car.

In 2008, Indians, TATA, are entering the market with a low priced car of less than 2,000 Euro. In fact, the One-Lahk car model is going to cost a few hundred Euro more in Europe, but that is not crucial. TATA delivers proof that it is possible to build a car that even in 2008 truly deserves the description Volkswagen.

A recently held tutorial at the Robert-Bosch-Consortium a market researcher presented the newest data in regards to low priced cars. According to that the global market for new cars with a price range of less than 7,000 Euro is growing on average 5 percent per year to more than 10 million vehicles till 2010. The remaining market is going to grow on average only 2.3 percent till 2014. Robert Bosch anticipates that the company is going to turn over one billion Euro with parts for low priced cars by 2010.

I think in our pursuit to offer more and more products to the consumer that satisfy wants, we should not forget to offer products that actually satisfy their needs. Not just simply with cheap products, but with those that are meeting the demand, are relevant and offer a very balanced cost/performance ratio. And this applies not only to the markets of the Second and Third World.