Bangalore-based auto ancillary firm Aditya Auto Products and Engineering India Pvt Ltd has entered into a technical alliance with the US-based auto parts maker Dura Automotive Systems for automotive technologies. | |
| Dura will supply the technology to Aditya for the manufacture of products like pedals, parking brakes, shifters and spare tyre carriers, while the auto parts will be manufactured at Aditya's plants and supplied to automotive OEMs in India and other Asean countries. |
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| As part of the alliance, Dura will provide designs, intellectual property and technical resources to Aditya in return for a 3 per cent licence fee. In three years, however, the two companies plan to enter into a JV in which Dura will have a 51 per cent stake and Aditya, the rest. |
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| The $2.9 billion Dura Automotive, which recently shut down two plants in N America and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in October 2006, said that tying up with an Indian company was part of the company's strategy to shift to low-cost manufacturing countries. |
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| It also said that it wanted to be part of India's rapidly-growing car market. |
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| "By 2012 India is projected to be the seventh largest automobile producer in the world. The size will be about 3 million cars per annum and we want our components to be used in every car produced in India," Dura's CEO and chairman president Lawrence A Denton said. |
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| "The share of our customers in the US, like GM and Ford is shrinking, so we think it will be easier to grow with new customers in the Indian markets," he added. |
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| Dura is also looking at introducing some new concepts in India like expandable luggage compartments in cars and sliding doors. |
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| "Not only are we going to provide technology to Aditya, we are also looking at setting up an engineering technology centre here, but things are in a very nascent stage. So we cannot say by when we will set it up," Denton added. |
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| Aditya recorded sales of Rs 72.5 crore in fiscal 2006-07 and supplies auto parts to companies like Eicher, Mahindra and Maruti Suzuki. It has four manufacturing units. |
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