Escorts Jcb Mulls Bangalore As Hub For South-East Asia

Escorts JCB Ltd (EJCB), the Rs 320 crore manufacturer of earth-moving and construction equipment, is looking at Bangalore as its manufacturing hub for the south-east Asian region, even as Pune and Chennai emerge as the other hot destinations for the EJCB expansion thrust.

EJCB will be pumping in close to Rs 200 crore initially for its India expansion plan, and bringing in new technology and products to the Indian market.

The company's first Indian manufacturing unit is located at Ballabgarh.

The Escorts-JCB joint venture equation turned around last June with JCB taking a controlling (60 per cent) stake in the joint venture. Earlier, Escorts held 60 per cent while JCB had 40 per cent.

"We took a controlling stake because that was the only way to bring in new technology which would benefit both sides,"' John Palmer, the JCB spokesperson told Business Standard.

EJCBs Backhoe Loader has turned out to be the Indian favourite with over 13,000 machines operational in India and a market share of 85 per cent in the country's excavator loader market.

The Indian Defence Forces are one of the single largest customers, with a fleet of over 400 JCB machines employed for road building, trenching, handling ammunition storage etc.

EJCB is also planning to introduce a slew of new products, especially excavators and the new `Robot,' into the Indian market.

The new range of Robot 160 and 170 skid steer loaders will hit the Indian roads sometime next week in an extensive promotional campaign spanning the entire country. The compact Robot makes it particularly suitable for working in narrow and historically sensitive areas.

Escorts JCB Limited started operations in 1979 and is the fastest growing company in the Indian earth-moving and construction equipment industry. Last year, EJCB sold over 2000 units, registering a growth of over 49 per cent over previous figures.