Continental has announced major expansions in India. It is known that they recently acquired MTCL (Modi Tyres Company Limited).The new body CIL (Continental India Limited) is speeding up its operational strategies quite significantly in OEM business and replacement market in India. The production at Modipuram facility would be increased to more than one half million bus tyres (BTX) and bias trucks by CIL (Continental India Limited) this year. Taking that into consideration, they would further move on to increase TBX production to 1 million units by 2013. Additionally, CIL (Continental India Limited) did announce more investments of another fifty million Euros for producing radial tyres for commercial vehicles and passenger cars in the latter half of the year 2013.
EBG (Executive Board Member), Continental AG, Head of Tyre Division, Mr. Nikolai Setzer, elaborated in a press event in Delhi that there was increasing demand for automobiles with premium technology and quality tyres in India. He elaborated that they were convinced that radial tyres is the next step in the truck tyre market in India and that they were investing a further 50 million Euros or more in radial tyre production for trucks that would create a solid base in order to heed to that demand. The future would see CIL (Continental India Limited) manufacturing both bias and radial tyres at its Modipuram facility hence would be taking a major leap from its local production. This strategy employed by CIL (Continental India Limited) would create job opportunities as the company is planning to increase its capacity to more than one-third from the present 1600 employees to around 2200-2400 employees in the coming years.
Currently, CIL (Continental India Limited), has a grip over 110 distribution centres regionally and 1400 dealers all over the country that are providing access to end consumers and truck fleets. Plans would be made to add new dealerships on a regular basis. They claim that a big portion of their sales came from the aftermarket sales. CIL’s focus would still be in tyre replacement sector, and while being the leading automotive suppliers internationally, Continental also intends to increase market shares in OEM business in India.
