HMSI to invest Rs 400cr to ramp up prod capacity

New Delhi, Sep 26 (UNI) Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India (HMSI), wholly-owned subsidiary of Japan's Honda Motor Company, today said it will invest Rs 400 crore in the next two to three years to ramp up production capacity at its manufacturing facility at Manesar.

''We have already invested Rs 600 crore at our plant in Haryana and will invest another Rs 400 crore to raise our capacity to 1.2 million units from the current 9 lakh units in the next two to three years,'' HMSI President and CEO Yukihiro Aoshima told reporters here.

The 1.2 million target will be shared in a fifty-fifty proportion for the company's scooters and motorcycles, he said.

With an impressive market share of 70 per cent in the mid-size scooter segment, the company plans to launch age group-specific vehicles in the next one year.

Larger chunk of HMSI's revenues comes from its scooters, as the company sold six lakh vehicles last year of which merely one lakh were motorbikes.

Apart from its flagship 102 cc 'Activa', the company produces Honda Eterno, Dio, Unicorn and had recently launched Shine.

HMSI's contract workers at its Manesar plant had gone on a six-day long strike demanding regularisation of their jobs but called it off after an agreement was reached between the labourers and contractor on Sunday.

The company President, however, said the strike had no effect on the production at its Manesar facility.

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