• Saturday, July 27, 2024

Business

India now Suzuki’s second market to surpass 30m cumulative production mark

The achievement was reached faster in India compared to its home country Japan, the carmaker stated.

The emblem of Japanese automaker Suzuki Motor (Photo by KAZUHIRO NOGI/AFP via Getty Images)

By: Shubham Ghosh

SUZUKI Motor Corporation on Wednesday (3) announced that India has become the second country, after its home nation Japan, to surpass the cumulative production milestone of 30 million units.

The achievement was reached faster in India compared to Japan, the Japanese carmaker stated.

Maruti Suzuki India, the company’s subsidiary, accomplished the milestone by producing 30 million units of automobiles in India by the end of March 2024, as per Suzuki Motor Corporation’s statement.

“India becomes the second country after Japan in which Suzuki has reached this milestone, and the fastest country to reach 30 million units in just 40 years and 4 months since starting production in December 1983, breaking the record of 55 years and 2 months in Japan,” it said.

Read: Suzuki Motor unveils concept electric SUV ‘eVX’ as Auto Expo 2023 kicks off

Suzuki’s automobile production in India started with its first model, the Maruti 800 by the then Maruti Udyog Ltd, a joint venture between the company and the Indian government.

Currently, Maruti Suzuki India Ltd (MSIL) has manufacturing facilities at Gurugram, Manesar, in the northern state of Haryana and Hansalpur in the western state of Gujarat, from where the vehicles are rolled out.

Read: Auto industry should enhance localisation, invest in tech: Maruti Suzuki CEO

In a separate statement, MSIL said, “While over 2.68 crore vehicles have been manufactured at the company’s Haryana-based facilities, over 32 lakh vehicles were produced at Suzuki Motor Gujarat, a wholly owned subsidiary of MSIL.”

The M800, which revolutionised personal mobility in the country, played a significant role in this milestone with over 2.9 million units, it said, adding that other top contributors include successful models such as Alto 800, Alto K10, Swift, Wagon R, Dzire, Omni, Baleno, Eeco, Brezza and Ertiga.

“We remain committed towards ‘Make in India’ and have been strengthening our operations in the country, catering to domestic as well as global markets. We contribute nearly 40 per cent to the total vehicle exports from India,” MSIL managing director & CEO Hisashi Takeuchi said.

With India becoming the world’s third-largest passenger vehicle market and poised to grow stronger in coming years, he said, “To fulfil customer demand and aspirations, we plan to invest further and increase our annual production capacity to 4 million units by FY 2030-31.”

Further, Takeuchi said, “Working towards this, we will set up two new green field manufacturing plants of 10 lakh capacity each at Kharkhoda, Haryana and Gujarat. We will also enhance our range of models from present 18 to 28 by FY 2030-31.”

In January, the company announced an investment of Rs 35,000 crore to set up its second plant in Gujarat. In 2022, it had stated that it would invest Re 18,000 crore on a new manufacturing unit at Kharkhoda in Haryana.

(With PTI inputs)

Related Stories

Loading