Market Analysis: Assessing the Appeal of Audi A6 in India

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NON-TECHNICAL REPORT
An analysis to investigate the appeal of Audi A6 to be launched by Audi in Indian market

Table of Contents
RESEARCH TITLE....................................................................................................................... 2
1 INTRODUCTION.....................................................................................................................2
1.1 PROBLEM STATEMENT.......................................................................................................2
2 RESEARCH DESIGN.................................................................................................................4
2.1 METHODOLOGY..............................................................................................................4
2.2 STRATEGIES.................................................................................................................... 4
2.3 TIME HORIZON............................................................................................................... 5
2.4 TECHNIQUES AND PROCEDURES....................................................................................5
3 DATA COLLECTION.................................................................................................................6
3.1 QUALITATIVE RESEARCH.................................................................................................6
3.2 QUESTIONNAIRE.............................................................................................................6
3.2.1 STRUCTURE OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE.....................................................................6
3.3 SAMPLING...................................................................................................................... 7
3.4 LITERATURE REVIEW.......................................................................................................7
4 DATA ANALYSIS................................................................................................................... 10
5 FINDINGS............................................................................................................................. 19
6 RECOMMENDATIONS..........................................................................................................22
7 CONCLUSION....................................................................................................................... 23
REFERENCES........................................................................................................................... 24
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RESEARCH TITLE
“An analysis to investigate the appeal of Audi A6 to be launched by Audi in Indian market”
1 INTRODUCTION
This study aims to investigate and identify the appeal of Audi A6 launched by Audi among its
customers. It also identifies the preferences and behaviour of the end users. India has
become the second largest automobile market with nearly 25 million units, as it comprises
of young population and low-cost manpower along with dominance in digital technology.
The automobile industry in India has the potential to generate up to annual revenues of
$300 billion by 2026 and has become one of the most important markets for different
overseas automakers (Khan, 2018).
The company Audi has decided to tap the highly competitive and potential Indian market
through its launch of Audi A6. The company aims to compete with the other brands, for
instance, Rolls-Royce will be launched in Jan 2019, BMW i8 Roadster in Apr 2019, BMW Z4
in Dec 2019 and Porsche Macan Facelift by Jan 2019 and so on in luxury car segment (Khan,
2018). The next-gen A6 luxury sedan will arrive in the marketing in the early to mid-2019
and focuses on 3 characteristics of the sedan that are digitization, comfort and
performance. It possesses an A8-inspired styling along of host of tech inside plus 3.0-litre
engines with mild-hybrid technology (Saransh, 2018).
1.1 PROBLEM STATEMENT
The research problem of this research project is to investigate the appeal of Audi A6 to be
launched by Audi in the Indian market.
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The research questions are:
1. What is the level of the consumers’ acceptance regarding the Audi A6 to be launched
by Audi in India?
2. What are factors that will influence the buying decision of customers regarding
purchase Audi A6 in India?
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3. What is the perception of the consumers regarding the features offered by Audi in
Audi A6?
RESEARCH OBJECTIVES:
The research objectives are:
1. To investigate the acceptance level for Audi A6 among the consumers in the
automobile market in India.
2. To study the factors that influence the buying decisions of customers regarding
purchase Audi A6 in India.
3. To explore the perception of different user groups and segments regarding the
features of Audi A6.
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2 RESEARCH DESIGN
The research design represents the structure of the research process. In the present study,
the research design is descriptive in nature as it focuses on the case study of Audi A6 which
will be launched in India. This is a theory based research design in which the data is
collected, analysed and presented so as to provide insights and generate a positive outcome
of the research (Taylor et al., 2015). The main aim is to achieve the accurate results derived
from collected data and can be sued to develop up-to-date business cases.
2.1 METHODOLOGY
The research method selected for this research is a qualitative research method. This
method is selected to understand the perception and behaviours of the customers with
reference to Audi A6. This research will include different secondary sources of data such as
articles, journals, online blogs and reviews by experts and specialists, online publications
and so on. The data collected for the research will be analysed by combining the data from
different secondary sources (Taylor et al., 2015). The data and material from the secondary
sources, that are relevant and related to the research topic, will be included in this research.
A total of 55 types of research were studied and reviewed with the aim to understand the
research topic as well as the problem statement, of which 20 secondary sources were
included in this research.
Focus group is the common qualitative research method used for data collection regarding
the research topics (Silverman, 2016). An online survey can be done by sending a
questionnaire to the focus groups and collect their responses. It is the most useful method
to carry out market research regarding the launch of Audi A6 in India. The questionnaire
prepared to gain the insights of the respondents included open-ended questions. This open-
ended questionnaire will help in obtaining information about the adoption of Audi A6 by the
customers and also the factors that influence their buying decisions (Chakraborty and
Mazumdar, 2017).
2.2 STRATEGIES
The purpose of this research can be fulfilled by combining the strategies of different
research design. The qualitative research is used for this research to collect and review the
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information related to the research topic and problem. It provides the direction in carrying
out the research effectively (Gupta, 2018). The open-ended questionnaire helps in collecting
and analysing the perception of the consumers and also their acceptance level for the new
product that is Audi A6 launched by Audi.
2.3 TIME HORIZON
This research applied a cross-sectional time frame because of limitations in the availability
of time and budget (Lewis, 2015).
2.4 TECHNIQUES AND PROCEDURES
The present research includes secondary research and open-ended questionnaire focus
group survey to accomplish the objectives of the research (Lewis, 2015).
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3 DATA COLLECTION
3.1 QUALITATIVE RESEARCH
The qualitative research approach is been used for this proposed research design and
considered as efficient in obtaining the results from the large sample. The secondary source
has been reviewed and studied to collect data and information to obtain the results or the
research (Silverman, 2016). The acceptance level of the customers about the launch of Audi
A6 by Audi is understood by gathering the opinions, views, and perception of its online
participants. The research is concentrated on analysing the appeal of Audi A6 to be
launched by Audi in the automobile market in India. It also focuses on identifying the factors
that influence the purchasing decision of the consumers along with their perceptions about
the features of Audi A6 (Mathur et al., 2018).
3.2 QUESTIONNAIRE
The open-ended questionnaire is designed and distributed to collect qualitative data which
provides the defined information in a structured format. The survey was distributed through
Google drive in order to achieve the cost and time efficiency while collecting data instead of
directly acquiring the respondents (Sachdeva et al., 2015). The results of the online survey
can be generalised as a large sample size can be accessed at a low cost. The research
undertook the survey to analyse the responses of the respondents qualitatively
3.2.1 STRUCTURE OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE
The open-ended questions of the survey were screened in order to collect valid and reliable
responses. The open-ended questionnaire includes about 8 questions to be responded by
the participants. Open-ended questions were included to make it easy for the participants
to give their responses efficiently (Ro and Ha, 2019). The responses include the views and
opinions of the consumers regarding the launch of Audi A6 in the automobile market in
India.
The below are the open-ended questions in the questionnaire for the research project:
1. Which company car do you own?
2. What are the factors that influenced you to make purchase decision related to the
present car?
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3. Are you satisfied with your present car?
4. Are you aware of the launch of Audi A6 in India by 2019?
5. Which features of Audi A6 do you believe are benefits as an owner?
6. What are the appealing factors of Audi that will influence you as customers in India?
7. Do you believe that the price of Audi A6 will influence your buying decision in India?
8. Would you recommend this car to any of your close relatives? And why
9. Would you prefer to buy this car in future? And Why
3.3 SAMPLING
The convenient sampling method is used in the present research project by selecting the
participants who are easily accessible and convenient. The participants in this method are
selected by choice and not by chance. The desired sample size is obtained by considering
the time, location and cost and other factors etc (Thananusak et al., 2017). The secondary
sources that are reliable and relevant to the research topic are included in this research and
also the 30 complete open-ended questionnaires were selected by using a random sampling
method and analysed to meet the research objectives. The advantage of this sampling
technique is that it is time and cost efficient and easy to find the respondents (Silverman,
2016). One of the major disadvantages is that the results cannot be generalised as the
outcome may be biased in nature.
3.4 LITERATURE REVIEW
The growth of the automobile industry is intricately linked with the growth of the
economies of different countries. The economic growth of the developed countries is driven
by the automobile sector thus contributing to the GDP and to the exchequer (Bharadwaj,
2018). Luxury products are typically expensive but offer a smaller amount of advantages as
compared to the complementary products. Cars are one of the most important luxury
products which are perceived as important to consumers in term of ownership. 207
respondents were included to examine the effect of value perception on the buying
intention of luxury cars (Vaishnavee and Nandagopal, 2018).
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It was revealed that the purchase intentions of luxury cars are strongly related with the
status value, uniqueness value and hedonism whereas the purchase intentions are not
affected by conspicuous, price and wealth value (Vaishnavee and Nandagopal, 2018).
Another study stated that the evolution of automobiles started in the 17th century by Mr
Nicola-Joseph and gradual invention and changes led numerous companies to come with
different models and brands in the field of automobile industry. The role of the marketers is
to convince the consumer to make their purchase decisions considering the capabilities and
will permit the company. it was observed that the global branded cars are owned by the
people in India not only for sole conveyance purpose but also satisfy other needs such as
luxury, comfort, convenience and social status (Chitra, 2018).
The study carried out by Ro and Ha (2019) discovers the expectations of the consumers for
autonomous cars which will soon be available in Korea. About 1506 potential autonomous
care consumers are included to identify the relationships between attitude, expectations
and behavioural intentions. It was found that the safety, licensing, convenience, ethics and
the monetary cost has a direct effect on attitudes while monetary costs, safety and
convenience directly affect the intentions. It also demonstrates that the intentions are
significantly affected by attitude. This study provided that guidance regarding the factors
that affect the purchase intentions of consumers prior to the launch of autonomous cars.
There is a change in the Indian car market from being monopolistic to fully-competitive as
the customers experience the evolution in the choices and habits with the choices with the
features. The short form of NUDGE: iNcentives, Understanding mappings, Defaults Give
feedback, Expect errors, structured complex choices (Gupta, 2018). Nudge simply refers to
push through determined features to customers. The study aimed to find the features of
cars and promotion pushes the perception of the consumers in terms of look, feel and do
good. 490 new car owners in 5 cities in Maharashtra were included in this descriptive
research on car marketing (Gupta, 2018). It shows that the people in India are very much
conservative and like to go for value for money in cars.
Chakraborty and Mazumdar (2017) explored the perceptual mapping of 5 popular brands of
sedan cars that are Toyota, Suzuki, Audi, Honda and Renault on the basis of consumer
response. This research comprises two phases in which the first phase include 7
independent variables such as Seating Comfort, Looks, Mileage, Durability, Airbags,
feedback and fuel efficiency to identify the relative perception about these brands among
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the consumers. It helps in graphically plotting the perceptual brand positioning as well. In
the second phase, discriminant analysis is used to predict the preferences of consumers for
sedan brands on the basis of the significance given by them for the 7 parameters while
purchasing a sedan (Chakraborty and Mazumdar, 2017).
The Audi A6 was globally debuted at the 2018 Geneva Motor Show which is the eighth
generation car it has styling inspired by A8 and 3.0-litre engines with mild-hybrid
technology. It has legroom, headroom and shoulder room which are superior to its
predecessor and has an insignificant increase in dimensions (Saransh, 2018). It has the large
hexagonal grille that dominates the front fascia bordered by sharply styled LED headlights
and the bumper is redesigned. The interior of A6 is minimalistic and loaded with features
and has dual-screen setup. The German Carmakers expects Audi A6 to launch in early 2019
with the expected price range between Rs 53.84 lakh and Rs 54.84 lakh. This car will
continue to compete with the likes of Mercedes-Benz E-Class, Jaguar XF, BMW 5 series and
the Volvo S90 (Saransh, 2018).
In another article by Surendhar (2018), the next-gen Audi A6 is based on the MLB Evo
architecture and also receives a wide range of 4 as well as 6-cylinder diesel and petrol
engines. It follows the lines of the latest A8 and A7. It has an evolutionary exterior along
with sharper design elements. The new Audi A6 is lighter and improved in performance and
fuel efficiency also and it does not compromise in agility factors. It is claimed to be sportier
than the old model since it has improved suspension as well as a progressive steering
system (Patankar, 2018). It is upon the preference of the customer to choose the optional
sports differential and a sports suspension.
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4 DATA ANALYSIS
Question 1
Response table:
Tata Motors 2
Maruti 3
BMW 6
Mercedes 7
Skoda 3
Toyota 2
Audi 5
Honda 2
Total 30
7% 10%
20%
23%10%
7%
17% 7%
Which company car do you own?
Tata motors
Maruti
BMW
Mercedes
Skoda
Toyota
Audi
Honda
This table defines the car owned by the respondents while taking this open-ended
questionnaire survey. Audi is considered as a third popular brand in luxury car section after
Mercedes and BMW.
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Question 2
Response table:
Quality And Features 4
Free Insurance 5
Discounts 3
Media 3
Free Services 6
Friends And Relatives 4
Persuasion By Salesperson 2
Free Gifts 2
Extended Warranty 1
Total 30
13%
17%
10%
10%20%
13%
7% 7% 3%
What are the factors that influenced you to
make purchase decision related to present
car? Quality and features
free insurance
discounts
media
free services
friends and relatives
persuasion by salesperson
free gifts
extended warranty
The above the factors that had influenced the buying decision of the car owners related to
their present car, owned by them.
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