Toyota Fortuner’s prime rival Ford Endeavour India launch might be sooner than expected  

Since its launch in India, the Ford Endeavour has always been a prime rival of the Toyota Fortuner. However, as Ford left the Indian market, the Toyota Fortuner has dominated its segment and managed to have a monopoly in India. The Fortuner has received several price hikes and the top variant costs nearly Rs 60 lakh on road in India. However, as there is so another alternative in terms of a hardcore off-road SUV in the segment Fortuner is almost the segment king.

As Ford plans to enter the Indian market with its Endeavour SUV, it will be looking forward to disrupting the monopoly created by Toyota Fortuner. Even though the exact dates for the launch of the Ford Endeavour in India are unknown, it will be available around early 2025. However, some sources have revealed that the SUV might be available in India around 2024 end. Ford has already revealed that it will be directly importing the Endeavour for the initial period. However, the company will be assembling the Endeavour at the Chennai facility later.

If Ford brings the Endeavour as CBU (Complete Built Up), the launch will be sooner. The CBU import car limit is set up to 2500 units per year. If imported the price of the Endeavour will be high. However, the built quality of the car is expected to be good. Ford still has its Chennai plant and the facility previously produced the old generation. As the new generation of the Endeavour shares some underpinnings with the new-gen SUV, production of the new generation will not be tough.

Design and Exterior

The new Ford Endeavour will continue to sit on the Ranger pickup’s platform (ladder-frame architecture). It will get a large grille with a horizontal bar in the middle. The SUV gets new Matrix LED headlights with DRLs and inverted L-shaped LED tail-lights. In the interior, the Ford Endeavour will get a three-row cabin with 12-inch touchscreen and 12.4-inch digital instrument cluster.

Powertrain

The new Ford Endeavour which is also known as Ford Everest is certain markets gets option for two diesel engines. The Ford Endeavour might get a 2.0-litre turbo-diesel or 3.0-litre V6 turbo-diesel. The 2.0-litre engine will be available in single-turbo or twin-turbo versions while, the 3.0-litre V6 turbo diesel engine will be the same as that of the new Ranger. When it comes to gearbox, the SUV will be available in 6-speed manual and 10-speed automatic. We expect 2WD as well as 4WD to be available in the Ford Endeavour.