Chakan area near Pune is making news these days. First, Mercedes launched its bus from here and coming in direct competition with Volvo and then Tata Motors launched a new model of inter-city bus and re-launched an intra-city bus giving competition to both Volvo and Mercedes in the multi-axle cum passenger coach segment. What is common among all of them and this news is the fact that all of them have their plants in the upcoming Chakan area where they intend to manufacture new marvels to take over as much of the market share as they can.
Now then, since the automobile market of India is very keen on having more and more luxurious passenger cars, in order to fulfill that demand luxury car manufacturer Mercedes Benz is contemplating increasing its production output at its Chakan based manufacturing unit near Pune, Maharashtra. Once this planning succeeds, the production may get amplified to 20,000 units every year. The fresh assembly lines of Chakan will bring together the Mercedes Benz A Class, B Class hatchbacks and SUVs for the increasing demand, as for now. There are some other big plans for expansion in the country as well.The company is planning to invest money for the establishment of a paint shop at its Chakan unit. As of now, the company is dependent on the paint shop of Tata Motors’ for their works. Even the assembled transmissions and engines come from Force Motors to their assembly plant.
If we see the previous news updates, then we will find that till last month Mercedes Benz was all geared up to pour in approximately Rs.350 crore for the making of its five new cars, which are suppose to come out in the compact car segment within the next two years. Till now, as per assumption, Mercedes Benz has already invested somewhere close to Rs.650 crore and the next lot of investment may make the total amount to Rs.1,000 crore approximately. The German company has made a worldwide launch of its ten fresh and new car models recently, which will hit the global market by 2015. On this particular occasion, Head of Mercedes-Benz Cars and Chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG, Mr. Dieter Zetsche said that India is an essential automobile market for them and more so because of the increasing demand of the A and B segment cars. Hence, they intend to expand their network of dealership and intensify their manufacturing capacity as well to meet increasing demand for their cars.
The Chakan plant for manufacturing Mercedes Benz cars rolls out the units particularly for the luxurious automobile market of India. It doesn’t manufacture units for the export, but that’s for now as we do not know what the company has in mind for future since the docks of Mumbai are only 200 kms away from Pune. This move should help Mercedes regain its lost top position from BMW.
