Iran’s Car Quality Issues Linger

Iran Standards and Quality Inspection Company has released a new report on the quality of 41 locally-made cars.

ISQI officials said encouraging automakers to improve their performance and raising awareness among car buyers are one of the main goals of publishing the rankings.

The latest report comes while some Iranian car companies have outright ignored the findings as no change is observed in this month’s results, Asre Khodro, a local automotive website, reported.

The new statistics show domestic cars are still suffering from low ratings, with some of the models produced for over a decade.

According to ISQI’s report, in a 30-day period starting September 22, 35 car models and six types of pickup trucks were assessed.

The cars are classified in five price ranges from the lowest costing under 250 million rials ($7,143) to the costliest priced at above 1 billion rials ($28,571).

According to the latest findings, the locally made Mazda 3, Renault’s Sandero, Tondar 90 (L90 or Dacia Logan), Haima S7, Kia Cerato and IKCO’s Peugeot -based Runna ranked among the best in terms of quality with a 3-star rating.

The good news for the Kia Cerato, assembled by SAIPA, is that it joined the top-ranking cars by gaining another star.

All other cars were rated worse and received a one-star rating.

Another interesting issue about the recent ranking is that although the Tondar pickup truck is the only model to have earned three stars, all other trucks received a poor rating. However, Tondar pickup still has a small share in Iran’s auto market.

Since the implementation of the new quality assessment system, no local cars obtained more than three stars, which is still below international standards and may pose risks for foreign partners who seek to use Iran as a regional export hub.