Tata’s Zica is now Tiago

The Indian automotive leader scrambled for a new name for its new hatchback - inopportunely named Zica - when the spread of the virus with the homophonous name grabbed headlines and was declared an emergency by WHO.

We already know that Tata had spent a good amount of marketing dollars on promoting the car while it was still christened Zica, but the company threw more into it to run an online competition asking people to submit name suggestions. Out of 37,000 submissions, three were shortlisted – Civet, Adore and Tiago. If these are the best out of thousands, then there is a real lack of inspiration amongst the masses. The one that Tata went with is just ever so slightly more appealing.

 

However, any word in one language or culture could easily mean something unsavoury in another. Remember Kia Provo? (Read: I Name This New Car …?) A quick online search came up with the meanings of "Tiago" from around the world. Urbandictionary.com had a list. There are the benign ones, like “a great Portugese king” and the Portugese version of the name “James” (we don’t see the similarity though).

And then there’s others which made this writer snicker at her screen: “a sex god who is amazing at sex” (note the double use of the word “sex”) and “Sexy Brazilian, flirts with the ladies and always gets what he wants.” We’re not sure that all the drivers of the Tiago would protest to that. 

We kid you not.

It could also mean "a creepy guy" which could describe many of the future male owners of the car.

To us, it sounds like the portmanteau of the Malay word “tiada”, which means no, and “go” – essentially, “no go”.

Still, does it really matter in the end? The Chevy Nova, which sounds like “won’t go” in Spanish still did well in Latin America. 

What’s in a name, really? As long as it’s cheap and cheerful, it will sell. The Tiago will be launched in India on 28 March, adding another rival for the likes of Hyundai i10, Ford Figo and India's "most-loved hatchback car", the Maruti Suzuki Celery...opps, Celerio.