Exide India Weighs Willard Surajpur Unit Purchase

Exide India is weighing an outright purchase of Willard India's battery plant located at Surajpur in Uttar Pradesh.

The plant, with a capacity of nearly half-a-million batteries per annum, has been closed for the past couple of months following the erosion of the battery market coupled with the company's financial problems. The plant has been put on the block.

Meanwhile, Exide India is also weighing its options for going in for a full-fledged factory in Rajasthan or Haryana at an estimated cost of Rs 90 crore. It plans to raise the resources through internal accruals.

According to sources at Exide India, the talks with Willard are at a very preliminary stage.

Exide, is carefully evaluating the condition of the plant and machinery before proceeding further. Industry sources said there is every likelihood that the plant has machinery which is not cost-effective considering the fact that modernisation was not a priority area with Willard.

Meanwhile, Exide India's, Hosur plant is expected to start commercial production in April 1997. Exide expects to achieve the targeted 2.8 million batteries per annum.

Exide Batteries has projected a production and sales figure of 5 million batteries by the year 2000 which is inclusive of both industrial and automotive batteries with ranges from 1.5 amperes to 5,000 amperes.

Amongst the industrial and automotive battery manufacturers only Exide India and Standard Batteries along with the south-based Amar Raja Batteries are profit making companies.

The rest, including Amco Batteries, are making losses. Amar Raja Batteries is very dependent on railways and power tenders for its turnover.