Aiming to counter the hot selling Honda Civic which has taken away sales from Corolla, Toyota will launch the all new Corolla in the Indian market by the end of this year. The company is also planning to bring in other model and a small car especially for India is already in the works.

“In the world market, we are a leader, but in India we have challenges. We take India as a challenging market,” Toyota Kirloskar Motor Managing Director Hiroshi Nakagawa told reporters in New Delhi. Toyota only has a 3% share of the Indian market.

“We are going to expand our business in India and it is a big task. We will be introducing new models and new cars in New Delhi. The new Corolla model will be launched this year, we are just a few months away from it,” Nakagawa said

Without giving details, he said the new launches would be a mix of imported and domestically manufactured or assembled cars.

Earlier the company had announced plans to invest Rs 1,400 crore on setting up a second manufacturing unit at its existing facility in Bangalore to launch a ’strategic small’ car in India by 2010.

“Currently we are developing the small car. We are in the final stages of selecting equipment suppliers,” Nakagawa said adding the car would have high localisation of components.