Fiat is opening new car dealerships across the country on a war footing, aiming at 67 outlets by April and nearly double that by December as it tries to gain back ground lost over the last year when it ended a marketing partnership with Tata Motors. The Italian car maker will also roll out the sporty hatchback Punto Abarth and launch the iconic Jeep later this year.

Enrico Atanasio, MD of Fiat Group Automobiles India, tells Ajay Sukumaran that the company?s transition would be complete by the end of 2013 after which it is counting on the new car models to drive up market share. Edited excerpts:

You are aggressively expanding reach. What is the strategy to catch up?

Let me say there are different phases for the activity. We experienced a very difficult nine months in terms of results because we were relying on a mix of dealers. Some dealers were disconnecting from the brand, some were deciding to join the future brand. We crossed 2012 with a very poor result, I have to say, because 12,000 cars in one year is less than 0.5% market share. But, before that, we were in around 1%, which is something I am aiming to catch back this year from April to December. Then, with the new models, my objective is to double my result. After that, the locally produced Jeep will arrive. I expect with a full-year of activity with the all-new Linea and Jeep, we will go even further. So that is the third phase I am envisioning.

Fiat enjoys brand recall because it has been in India for decades. How do you translate that to a younger generation especially when you are competing with recent entrants?

We have a strong loyalty for the brand and that also includes a lot of young people. The reality is that those people have not yet been 100% addressed with the true Fiat experience. Therefore, we need to correct that situation through new dealerships and a new website, new call centre, new workshop and new level of service in parts and after sales through a dedicated team of people. The difference between Fiat and other brands is that Fiat is not starting from scratch. Of course, there is a little luggage from the past that we need to clean on our way. We believe we have taken some fundamental steps towards that direction. The future will tell us how quickly we will be able to catch back that 2%, 3% and up to the 5% (share) that we want.

By when do you expect to get to 5% market share?

We are launching nine new or significantly refreshed models in the next three years. I don?t expect to achieve the 5% in three years, but my view is that in five years we can do it.

What is the Fiat Group?s vision for its India operations?

Our Asia Pacific region has two major tasks, to develop the China and India markets. So we are looking for strong volume and conformation of that comes from the portfolio of products that we are bringing.

Fiat supplies diesel engines to other brands. How have you been able to leverage that for your own car sales?

For the moment we have not been able to leverage so much on sales because we were in a transition phase. Today, we serve four brands in India but we serve many more brands outside. Hopefully, we will make people more used to the fact that the technology they think is excellent in other brands is actually our technology and, therefore, they should buy 100% of the technology. But that is a process and you must have a network to do that.