By Venkatachari Jagannathan

Seoul, May 17 (IANS): Heartened by a maturing Indian automobile market, Hyundai Motor has decided to launch at least one new model in the country every year even as moves are afoot to expand the rural marketing network and localise more components.

"Our plan is to introduce more than one new model every year and refurbish more than one existing model to gain market share," the company's managing director Han Woo Park told a group of visiting Indian journalists at the company's headquarters here.

"In addition we will expand our dealership for deeper market penetration in India," Han said about the Indian market where the company has the capacity to produce 600,000 cars per annum from its two units in Chennai, of which a third is exported.

Hyundai claims to be India's largest exporter of cars and second largest passenger car manufacturer after the Indo-Japanese Maruti-Suzuki. Last fiscal, the company's Indian operations accounted for 600,588 cars -- a 20.8 percent growth over the year before.

The Indian arm, company officials said, currently exports cars to some 110 countries across EU, Africa, Middle East, Latin America, Asia and Australia. It has been the number one exporter of passenger car out of India for the sixth year in a row.

The company's current offerings in India include the Santro Xing, i10, i20, Accent, Verna and Sonata Transform.

According to company officials, among the new cars that could be launched in India is a diesel variant of its popular i10 model that is being exported out of Chennai, with the engines sourced from South Korea.

Also on the anvil is the Santa Fe sports utility vehicle, a new Sonata sedan and a fully refurbished i20 and i10 models. And to reach out to a larger market, the company's India arm will also expand its dealer network, focused on rural India, officials said.

"The growth is higher in markets beyond the 40 major Indian cities," Han said. "Our main priority is the domestic market where the demand is increasing. A fall in exports is not a major concern."

The Indian plant has shipped out around 50,000 units of i20 to the European Union, which is now catered by the group's plant in Turkey owing to the duty advantage the country is getting as an associate member of the European Union.