Fiat launches new Punto but keeps cheap insurance

Posted :06-09-2005

Although it is a sportier, larger model baptized the "Grande Punto", Fiat's new Punto has remained small enough to fit into lower, and cheaper, motor insurance brackets.

The car, which is a few centimetres longer than past models, includes more optional features also, such as sunroofs, different colours and materials for the interior, and variations on the car's engine.

The car was launched amid fanfare in Turin, the northern Italian city where the company is based.

Fiat - seeking to reverse the long decline of its once-great car business - is pinning its hopes on the Punto to seal its financial future.

"With this car, which is drawing an attention that had not been seen in years, we want to say, 'Fiat is back,'" Fiat Chairman Luca Cordero di Montezemolo said in an interview published in La Stampa, a Turin-based paper.

Fiat has sold 6 million Puntos since it first launched the car in 1993. Four years later, it became the best-selling car in Europe.

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