Volvo's body building plant to start op in Dec

Bangalore, June 22: The Body Building plant of Volvo India, the leading heavy truck and bus manufacturer, will be ready by December, Company Managing Director Eric Leblanc said today.

Talking to newsmen here, he said that the project located at the Volvo plant near the city was a joint venture with Azad Hind. It would initially build bodies for 1000 buses and the capacity would be increased according to the demand. Production from this plant would also be utilised for export purpose.

About exports from its Indian plant, Mr Lablanc said that at present trucks were exported to Korea and there were possibilities of exporting to Myanmar, Indonesia and to China by next year. Last year 300 trucks were exported to Korea, he added.

He said that the present capacity of the plant was 1600, for both trucks and buses and it would be increased to 2500 next year.

Replying to a question, he said that at present 140 employees worked on the assembly line and the strength may be increased when two shift system was introduced next year when the expansion of the plant was complete.

To another question, he said that the company growth was expected to be between 10 to 15 per cent this year. However, he declined give the actual figures. Last year 650 trucks were sold, he said.

Mr Leblanc said that Volvo was exploring markets in neighbouring States for supply of modern Volvo buses and already enquires have been received from city transport services of Pune and Chennai.

Earlier, the MD handed over keys of the 200th Volvo tipper to VPR and Co Partner V Prabhakar Reddy. He was one of the 12 global customers selected by the company. VPR and Co, a leading civil contractor operating in the mining and irrigation sector, has became the owner of the largest fleet of Volvo Tippers in India.

UNI