Italian auto major, Fiat India on Wednesday launched its long-awaited mid-sized car Linea. The new Linea will be available in both Multi Jet diesel and Fire petrol engine versions. The new Linea available at a starting price of Rs 6.17 lakh (ex-showroom Mumbai)

The car designed by the Fiat Style centre in Turin will go on to become Fiat’s flagship product in India.

Fiat India has started manufacturing and assembly line for engines and cars at its Ranjangaon plant near Pune in Maharashtra. The start of production of the flagship car also signifies the progress of Fiat's facility which is an industrial Joint Venture with Tata Motors Ltd. The 200 acre facility now has a completely equipped body shop, assembly line, a paint shop which is to be commissioned shortly and the Powertrain Plant.

Linea is a C plus segment sedan which was launched internationally in May 2007 in Istanbul, after which it met with great success in all markets where it is present. An elegantly functional car, with a strong Italian imprint, it will be equipped with features found in higher segment cars. The launch of Linea will be followed by the Grande Punto, a successful hatchback from Fiat's stable, which will also be manufactured from the Ranjangaon facility. The Grande Punto is a top seller in Europe and has an annual sales of about 3, 50,000.

The car Linea is expected to create a new sub-segment between the mid-sized cars and the luxury cars segment due to its unique design, comfortability, performance and features. Linea was first launched in Turkey & is presently sold in more than 50 countries across Europe, Asia, Central & South America and Africa. Besides Turkey, the Linea is produced in Brazil and now in India. It will also be manufactured in Russia in the near future.  

The FIRE (Fully Integrated Robotized Engine) will power the petrol version of the Linea, and the diesel version will be equipped with the Advanced New Generation MULTIJET engine.

This sedan stands out in terms of original style, functionality and drivability, in addition to offering a very competitive price/content ratio. To begin with, the car will be retailed through a select 70 Tata-Fiat dealer outlets spread across the country.

The three basic versions would be known as Active, Dynamic & Emotion with similar set of features for both variants. The Linea will be available in 4 colors at the time of the launch, Flamenco Red, Minimal Grey, Perla Champagne and Hip Hop Black.

The Tata-Fiat dealer network will ensure easy availability of the car and satisfactory aftersales service for its owners. The car will be retailed by Tata-Fiat dealer network providing 100 sales outlets & workshop across the country by mid-2009. Eventually, this number will be more than 125 by year end, which will provide an even stronger geographical reach for the car.

Style:
Fiat Linea bears a strong European character with an Italian lineage. Certain visible design cues like the long sloping hood merging into a protruding front grill, escorted by prominent yet stylish headlamps are normally seen only in high end sports cars. The exceptional design expertise offers Fiat Linea the most stylish exteriors that make it compete with the cars from the higher segment for being the best-looking set of wheels.

Comfort & Safety:
The great design capabilities go beyond the impressive exteriors and equip the car with a luxurious cabin designed to offer maximum comfort for the front & rear passengers. Comfortable seating with ample amount of legroom, rear hat trey with collapsible sunscreen & exclusive features like the rear knee level & foot level AC vents are some design features that makes the car an object of desire. Further, the emotion variant comes with safety features including ABS with EBD and Dual front airbags with pretensioners & load limiters on front seatbelts.

Engineering:
Fiat has had a long tradition of engineering variety of cars for all diverse automotive needs. eginning from most popular city cars like the Uno and the Palio, to the high end sports cars ike Maserati, Alfa Romeo and the professional racing champion like Ferrari, Fiat has made it ll. At Fiat, we engineer the cars to meet customer expectations. With the same thought Fiat s bringing to India two of its most successful engine – 1.4 16V FIRE petrol engine & the 1.3 6V Advanced Multijet diesel. The fiat power-train manufacturing facility in Ranjangaon is at par with the best of the plants fiat has globally. With an installed capacity of over 200,000 ngines & 300,000 cars it is a state of the art manufacturing facility adhering to international tandards of production of cars & engines.