Hyundai to ramp up production capacity by 12%

The country's second largest carmaker, Hyundai Motor India, today said it will increase production capacity by about 12 per cent to 6.7 lakh units per annum at its Chennai facility.

The company, which is India's largest car exporter, has planned to reduce overseas shipments by 8 per cent this year at 2.5 lakh units in order to meet domestic demand.

The India unit expects to sell 340,000 vehicles in India in 2010 and export 2.50 lakh to 2.55 lakh vehicles, its Managing Director H W Park, said on Friday.

In 2009, the company sold 2.90 lakh cars in India and exported 2.59 lakh cars, he said.

"We are making minor investment to increase our production capacity to up to 6.7 lakh units per annum," Hyundai Motor India Ltd (HMIL) Managing Director H W Park told reporters here.

He, however, declined to share details about how much investment the company is planning to put in for enhancing the production capacity.

HMIL has capacity to produce six lakh units per annum at its Chennai facility.

When asked about its sales target in the overseas markets, Park said: "We have fixed the export for this year at 2.5 lakh units, slightly less than last year, as we are focusing to meet our domestic demand."

The company had exported 2.71 lakh units during last year.

He said the company is expecting to sell 3.4 lakh units in the domestic market this year compared to 2.9 lakh units in last year.

Asked if the company is planning to introduce its flagship models, such as Santro and i10, with smaller engines, Park said: "There will be no small engine for i10 or Santro."

Earlier this week, the country's largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki India launched a 1,000cc variant of its best seller Alto, mainly to lure customers opting for Santro, i10 and General Motors' Spark. It, however, decided to continue with the 800cc Alto to offer more choices.