[volkman10]

Just a few months after having a groundbreaking ceremony for a new plant in Tamil Nadu, Vinfast has already begun testing cars in India and the VF e34 mid-size SUV testing has been spied.

The VF e34 is currently on sale in Vietnam and Indonesia and is the automaker’s smallest vehicle in its range. It is powered by a 110kW battery pack with a claimed range of 318km and a 0-100kmph time of under nine seconds. Most importantly it is 4.3-meters long with a wheelbase of 2.6-meters putting it in the same size range as the Kia Seltos/Hyundai Creta/Maruti Grand Vitara/Toyota Urban Cruiser Hyryder/Honda Elevate and the MG Astor.

expect a pricing of Rs 20 lakh to Rs 25 lakh and it will take on cars like the MG ZS EV, Maruti eVX, Kia Carens EV, and Mahindra XUV.e8, Honda Elevate EV and the production version of the Toyota Urban Sport Concept.

Link:

[DIY410]

Article has incorrectly listed the Maximum Motor power as battery capacity.
The actual battery capacity is 44.5kWh, with a useable capacity of 42kWh.

[mobike008]

Recently, checked out their high end products at the Vancouver Auto Show meant for North American market.

Considering the quality looked terrible so I can imagine the product coming into India would be worse.

[-istormoll]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Recently, checked out their high end products at the Vancouver Auto Show meant for North American market.

Considering the quality looked terrible so I can imagine the product coming into India would be worse.

Yeah, but it's still best to hope for the best. And it all depends on the car brand. For example, a friend of mine bought a Chevrolet and he's happy with the quality.

[frankmehta]

I sat in VinFasts in Viet Nam earlier this year. Quality is one notch lower than a premium Tata or a Mahindra. Definitely requires more attention towards plastic quality and driver information.
Seats were comfy, and legroom was good, but it's great as a taxi, not much a a premium passenger car.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Considering the quality looked terrible so I can imagine the product coming into India would be worse.

As I had suspected. I don't see a use case for them in India at all. We already have Indian carmakers doing very well within EVs, Chinese carmakers with growing ambitions & Japanese carmakers with 2-3 year plans (e.g. Maruti).

Vinfast has no USP. Who would spend 20-25 lakhs on a Vinfast? If a newcomer has to crack the market, they need USPs (e.g. BYD Seal). Poor quality is hardly a starting point.

Originally Posted by -istormoll

For example, a friend of mine bought a Chevrolet and he's happy with the quality.

Chevrolet, as you know, is part of GM which is a 100+ year old company. It was also the No.1 carmaker in the world for 80 years. Comparing a Chevrolet to Vinfast is going nowhere.

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by GTO

As I had suspected. I don't see a use case for them in India at all. We already have Indian carmakers doing very well within EVs, Chinese carmakers with growing ambitions & Japanese carmakers with 2-3 year plans (e.g. Maruti).

Vinfast has no USP. Who would spend 20-25 lakhs on a Vinfast? If a newcomer has to crack the market, they need USPs (e.g. BYD Seal). Poor quality is hardly a starting point.

Absolutely correct. I sat in one of their high end SUV offering in Vancouver Auto Show and I was aghast to see the plastic quality, buttons felt cheap and overall interior did not feel like a $75K car (I asked the sales lady the price).

Besides, who will trust a brand new car company coming out of Vietnam. The Koreans took a long time to build the brand and trust.

I reckon they have a long way to go before acceptance.

[ads11]

Erm don't know how much of this is true but definitely seen some Twitter threads highlighting some sketchy bits of info about Vinfast, including the fact that a lot of the cars bound for the US to much fanfare are sitting gathering dust in an empty lot.

I believe the threads alluded to the fact that Vinfast through virtue of their powerful billionaire owner and his links to the Vietnamese communist party results in this shall we say paper tiger image. I've heard the word SPAC thrown about too so it all seems like there's both geopolitical and market chicanery afoot with the enterprise.

I'd echo GTO - unless Vinfast make ridiculously low pricing their USP, they're really rowing against the tide with any of their offerings should they come to India. I hadn't realised they'd gone so far as to break ground on a facility in India. How far along is that? I ask because they're stalled on one of their flagship overseas factories in the USA aren't they?

[Reese]

I have honestly rarely seen a company get laughed at as much as Vinfast has when cars were sent out to reviewers in the states. At least they can be thankful that the reception wasn't as horrid as the Humane AI Pin

Though most of the complaints about the car were about the terrible integration of malfunctioning technology in it, even in something as important as ADAS, over the mediocre build quality. They should've sat on their cars locally and polished them before trying to sell it in markets that have better options available. I would've said that India is the kind of market where such a car would've sold, but with upcoming launches from Tata and Mahindra catering to the lower price range, and Koreans and Germans catering to the middle and higher end, it truly dosen't make sense for them to try and break through with their current slate

[careind]

There were some allegations that critics who gave out negative comments about Vinfast products were threatened by the police and made to delete their negative comments.

But an interesting fact is that Tata technologies worked very closely with Vinfast in developing some of their models. Details in this article.

https://insideevs.com/features/70817...ritic-vietnam/

Not sure why that has come back to India, given that TATA has enough electric models for now and the future of its own.

[invidious]

Just returned from Vietnam and one of the properties I stayed in was owned by the Vinfast owner and thus all cars and buses were Vinfast. I was surprised at how good and comfortable the buses were. Good shock absorbers, comfy seats, charging points all over. Perhaps that’s something they should look at?

I had read the negative reviews of the Americans so was expecting Vinfast cars themselves to be terrible. They were not. I didn’t drive one but seats were comfortable and the ride was okay. The fit and finish was average though. Designs were derivative - no originality or design language to speak of. Basically any of their cars could pass off as an Asian car from Japan or Korea or China if the badge were replaced.

[rb003]

There's no reason why someone should put their hard earned dough behind a Vinfast. Their global reviews range from awful to middling at best, and they don't have the dramatic price differential which Chinese carmakers have used to great effect around the world. They have neither a reputation of cutting-edge technology, driving dynamics, nor reliability. Hard pass. Doubly worse for them, unlike many other markets, perfectly suitable local brands already exist in their market segments. Tata and Mahindra nowadays make products which are equivalent or a half-step behind global equivalents, which means one needn't even look Japanese / Korean / Chinese in order to find a more proven alternative.

Adding to this, Vinfast have a draconian reputation in their homeland, and they are famous for accosting critics of their cars with legal action - hardly the sort of corporate behaviour that consumers should be encouraging with their wallets

[TorquePull]

They don’t seem to offer anything unique to get me excited. Even the logo looks similar to the Mahindra logo. They must have done their research before investing in India, so curious to see if they succeed.

The negative reviewer being arrested puts a lot of bad light on the group’s integrity. Wonder what their product support will be like in the future.

[Itachi_Uchiha]

I don't even see why would one buy this over the existing products in the market. They don't have any special features, any special USP, any special pricing, nothing at all. It might be even more expensive than the others. People have already been saying they don't have any premium quality products even outside India. I think they would fail in India and it would be a waste of their own money.

Even the Chinese competitor like BYD has such a good pricing and lots of USP, that's the reason they sell a good amount.

Tata and Mahindra on the other hand are already well established and well reputed brand hence their good sales.

[volkman10]

Vinfast VF e34 seen on a flatbed truck.

CBU version of the VF e34 will launch in FY25.