Honda begins two-wheeler exports from Gujarat plant

Sends first consignment to Sri Lanka from Mundra port

Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India Private Limited (HMSI) has begun exporting two-wheelers from its Gujarat plant. The company has sent its first consignment of Honda Dio scooters to Sri Lanka from Mundra port last week.

"We have started exporting from Gujarat plant from last week. We have sent Honda Dio scooters from Mundra port to Sri Lanka which will reach there by end of this month," said Yadvinder Singh Guleria, senior vice president, sales and marketing at HMSI.

However, the company is not planning to increase exports from here and will export to Sri Lanka only as of now. "Sri Lanka and Nepal are major export markets for us and we will continue to focus on them. Right now we have no any plans to export to other countries from Gujarat as we have just begun the same," Guleria added.

HMSI claimed that Sri Lanka and Nepal contributes almost 75 per cent share in its total exports of about 120,000 units during first half of current financial year 2016-17.

HMSI commenced Activa and Dio production in Gujarat in February 2016 which is now running at full capacity of 1.2 million units a year. The company is, however, expanding its production capacity by 600,000 units at its Narsapura plant in Karnataka which is likely to be completed by June 2017.

"With this new expansion, our total production capacity will reach 6.40 million units from current 5.80 million units. We have planned to invest about Rs 400 crore in Karnataka plant expansion," Singh said.

The company has launched new two-wheeler 'Navi' earlier in this calendar year which it claims to have received good responses from urban areas. HMSI has thereby almost doubled its sales target for Navi.

Guleria said, "At the time of launch, we had set target to sell 50,000 units but we have achieved the same in October. Hence, we are changing our sales target to 90,000 units for Navi scooter."