Buoyant auto market boosts Rajkot machine tools industry

Order books double to Rs 1,400 crore

With buoyancy returning to automobile and infrastructure sector, the machine tools industry in Rajkot has been benefiting lately.

As against a 25 per cent rise in production capacity, order books for the industry has been rising by about 100 per cent.

"We are enjoying a better market position since sometime. In Rajkot, the machine tools industry is having orders worth Rs 1200-1400 crore on hand," said Sailesh Kava, president of Rajkot Machine Tools Manufacturers' Association (RMTMA).

According to Kava, such has been a surge in order books by sectors like auto and infrastructure that the machine tools units have been finding it hard to fulfill the requirements.

 

This, in spite of the industry expanding its production capacity last year. What's more, the Rajkot-based industry had also seen addition of 100 new manufacturing units recently.

"The machine tools industry in Rajkot has been benefiting mainly from the steady growth in auto industry in India. Last year several small and medium units grew by 70 to 100 per cent and expanded their production capacity by 20-25 percent," said Rupesh Mehta, managing director of MacPower Industries, which itself had invested about Rs 5 crore for expansion in two years.

Moreover, according to industry sources, on an average units have invested Rs 50 lakh to Rs 2.5 crore for capacity addition.

Rajkot has about 350-400 machine tools players, of which 95 per cent units produce conventional machine tools and supply across India. According to industry sources since last few years share of local consumption of tools have also increased from 10 to 20 percent given the growth in auto parts, foundry and engineering industries.

During financial year of 2010-11, the industry achieved its target of Rs 800 crore turnover, posting a growth of 30 percent. The Rajkot based industry has also lately seen support from the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) for technology upgradation.