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Business News/ Companies / News/  Tata Motors plans to operationalise Ford's Sanand plant in 12-18 months to scale up production
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Tata Motors plans to operationalise Ford's Sanand plant in 12-18 months to scale up production

The automaker's production capacity currently stands at around 50,000 units a month

A Tata Motors Ltd.'s commercial vehicle dealership in Mumbai, India. (Bloomberg)Premium
A Tata Motors Ltd.'s commercial vehicle dealership in Mumbai, India. (Bloomberg)

Automotive manufacturing company Tata Motors is planning to commence operations at the Gujarat-based manufacturing plant it acquired from Ford, over the next 12-18 months to scale up its production capacity.

"We are targeting to operationalise the Ford plant in 12 to 18 months," Tata Motors Managing Director - Passenger Vehicle and Electric Vehicles Shailesh Chandra said when asked about the production capacity at the firm's disposal.

The automaker's head of passenger vehicle business also said that the firm's production capacity currently stands at around 50,000 units a month.

Earlier this month, Tata Motors completed the acquisition of Ford India's manufacturing plant at Sanand via a subsidiary. 

In August 2022, the company had announced that its arm Tata Passenger Electric Mobility Ltd (TPEML) would acquire Ford India Pvt Ltd's (FIPL) Sanand plant, Gujarat for around 726 crore.

‘Acquisition timely, a win-win for all stakeholders’

Tata Motors had earlier noted that with its manufacturing capacity nearing saturation, the acquisition is timely and a win-win for all stakeholders. The Sanand plant has a manufacturing capacity of 3 lakh units per annum, which is scalable to 4.2 lakh units per annum.

TPEML is in the process of making necessary investments to reconfigure the plant to adapt to the Mumbai-based automaker's existing and future vehicle platforms. The unit is adjacent to the existing manufacturing facility of Tata Motors at Sanand.

In an analyst call, Chandra had said that the company also has the ability to debottleneck capacities at its two existing facilities at Pune and Sanand by an additional 10-15 per cent.

Answering a question regarding the firm's preparedness to transition its product range to conform to second phase of BSVI emission norms, Chandra said: "It is on track and ahead of the deadline."

The stricter emission norms come into force from 1 April, 2023. When asked about business outlook, Chandra said that after a long duration of supply-driven industry, now the industry is in a situation where supply has completely normalised.

"It is meeting the demand for all the regular models except for some popular models which are still high on the waiting list. Overall enquiry to the retail time has increased for the industry. This is a signal of lack of urgency among the customer with improved supplies," he added.

The company will have to take a fresh look at the demand situation closely post the implementation of the BS VI Phase 2 emission norms with vehicle prices expected to go up due to the rollout of the new regulatory mechanism, he further said.

"In terms of actions, we are willing to go for very focused demand generation initiatives specifically in certain segments as well as hyper markets," Chandra noted.

And as far as margin is concerned, the automaker is taking structural material cost reduction actions and continues to drive other levers of margin improvement, Chandra stated.

Commenting on sales outlook, he said with a lean inventory and improved supplies, the fourth quarter should be strong in terms of wholesales when compared to the third quarter.

On the company's expected model mix by 2030, Chandra said: "If we have to take a view by the end of this decade, the mix will be around 25-30 per cent for CNG, 25-30 per cent for the EV and rest would be gasoline, but with high mix of flex-fuel because that is the direction where things are going."

Tata Motors total vehicle sales rise to 81,069 units in Jan

Tata Motors had reported a 6.4 per cent growth in total vehicle sales at 81,069 units in January. In the year-ago period, the company's total vehicle sales stood at 76,210 units.

Domestic vehicle sales were up 10 per cent at 79,681 units in the previous month over 72,485 units in 2022, Tata Motors had said in a statement earlier.

The company said its passenger vehicles domestic sales, including electric vehicles, during the month under review stood at 48,289 units, which was 18 per cent higher when compared to 40,942 units in the corresponding period of the last year.

The total commercial vehicles domestic sales, however, declined 7 per cent to 32,780 units in January 2023 from 35,268 units a year ago.

With agency inputs

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Published: 05 Feb 2023, 01:38 PM IST
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