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| JK Tyre to increase radial supplies to Tata, Ashok Leyland |
| Press Trust of India / Mysore Nov 02, 2009, 14:40 IST |
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JK Tyre & Industries is looking to increase direct supply of truck and bus radial tyres to commercial vehicle makers like Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland by three times in next two years.
The company, which recently increased production capacity of truck and bus radials to 800,000 units annually, sells only 5 per cent of it to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), with the rest going to the after sales market.
"In truck and bus radials, our sales to OEMs is only about 5 per cent of our annual total production. We are now looking to increase the share by three times to 15 per cent within the next two years," JK Tyre & Industries Vice Chairman and MD R P Singhania said.
He added the rate of radialisation (changing from the traditional tyres that uses nylon threads to the one that uses steel wire) among truck and bus manufacturers is increasing rapidly and JK Tyre is aiming to tap this market.
"Companies like Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland have increased the use of radials and we are hopeful of tapping the market offered by OEMs," Singhania said.
He added currently in India, the overall radialisation in trucks and buses is only 10 per cent but the figure is going to increase to 25 per cent within the next five years. In the last fiscal, total commercial vehicle sales in the country were 384,000 units, according to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers.
JK Tyre had last week announced plans to further increase its capacity of truck and bus radials to 120,000 units annually within next two years, from the existing 800,000 units.
The additional capacity, part of the company's Rs 1,200- crore investment plan over next 3-4 years, would be made either at JK Tyre's truck and radial plant at Mysore or in its upcoming greenfield project in one of the Southern states.
Singhania said radials are increasingly preferred by CV owners as they have longer lifespan, besides offering better mileage, quoting studies by the Pune-based Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT).
"Radials are more expensive than bias tyres but they deliver more than double the mileage of bias tyres. Radial tyres also offer 12 per cent more fuel efficiency than the bias tyres and so ultimately, radials are more economic," he said.
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