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India’s best selling diesel engine will be discontinued in 3 years

Fiat’s 1.3 liter Multijet diesel engine will soon be going out of production. Easily the best selling diesel engine in India, it currently powers popular cars like Maruti Swift, Dzire, Vitara Brezza, Ertiga, Ciaz, S-Cross, Baleno, Ignis, and many more.

The reason this engine will go out of production is that its two biggest buyers, Maruti and Tata will no longer be needing it. Both, Maruti and Tata will be launching their own diesel engine to power their cars, and thus will no longer need Fiat’s 1.3 liter MultiJet diesel engine

Maruti Suzuki India Limited and Tata Motors are very close to finishing the development work on their new gen diesel engine. MSIL is developing a new 1.5 liter, 4 cylinder diesel engine which is currently in the final stages of development. Once launched, Maruti will replace the 1.3 liter engine from Fiat with their own 1.5 liter engine.

Tata Motors too is developing a range of new diesel engine. One of that has already launched – 1.05 liter 3 cylinder now seen in Tigor and Tiago. Second will be 1.5 liter 3 cyl which will launch with Nexon on 21st Sep. Two more are in the making – 1.5 liter 4 cylinder and 2.0 liter 4 cylinder. These will be launched by 2020.

Compared to the 1.3 liter MultiJet, the new gen engines from Maruti and Tata will be much more advanced and BS6 upgradable. On the other hand, Fiat’s 1.3 liter Multijet diesel engine needs certain upgrades to comply with the new BSVI emission norms that will be mandatory from 2020 onwards. Added investments in preparing the Multijet engine for BS6 will not be feasible if their two top customers are no longer with them.

Fiat India’s sales volumes are also too small to justify these added investment costs to upgrade the engine to being BS VI compliant. Losing both MSIL and Tata Motors as customers does not justify these huge investments and hence the 1.3 liter Multijet will be pulled out of production by the turn of the decade.

Over the years, the 1.3 liter Multijet engine has clocked more than 3 million units in sale, powering 24 models from 5 automakers such as Maruti, Tata Motors, Chevrolet, Premiere and Fiat. It has been the best selling diesel engine in India.

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