Cynosure plans battery facility in Hyd

Launches upgraded versions of battery-powered scooters.

Hyderabad-based Cynosure Enterprises Limited, which launched the upgraded versions of battery-powered scooters "� Yash Docile plus and Yash Pretty e-Bike "� here on Tuesday, is planning a manufacturing facility for batteries, the key component of the vehicle, at Hyderabad.

The company plans to set up the facility in joint venture with Zhejiling Changton e-bike Company Limited, the Chinese CKD (completely knocked down) unit supplier to the firm.

This will be the first manufacturing facility catering to battery-powered vehicles, which are currently being imported into the country from China in the CKD form, according to Mandali Srinivasa Rao, managing director of the company.

Cynosure is set to become a subsidiary of Mumbai-based Mobile Telecommunications Limited, a contract manufacturing company listed on the BSE, which has partnered the former in the ongoing battery powered two-wheeler business on a 50:50 shareholding basis.

Mobile Tele is a Rs 35-crore market cap company. It registered a turnover of Rs 50 crore last year.

The company will invest about Rs 25 crore in the battery manufacturing facility and has already acquired 10 acres of land from the Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (APIIC)-promoted industrial estate at Hyderabad.

"The equity holding between the Chinese company and Cynosure is yet to be crystalised but we expect them to bring in 40 per cent equity into the project," AB Vedmehta, chairman and managing director, Mobile Telecommunications Limited, said.

The company has access to European funds to meet their future investment requirement in the whole project, he added.

Cynosure has so far sold 6,000 vehicles across five states, including Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, and proposes to set up 9 assembly lines, including the two already operating assembly units in Hyderabad and Jaipur, by March, 2008.

According to Vedmehta, the company has till date invested about Rs 4.5 crore and plans to invest Rs 18 crore in the assembly lines.

"We are quite optimistic that our sales would surpass the 20,000-mark during the current financial year," said Rao, who claims that Yash is the first battery-powered two-wheeler to be sold in the country.

Seeing the demand for battery-run two-wheelers during the current year, which is expected to be 1.5 lakh units, he said they were optimistic about producing vehicles locally in future.

Though about 22 companies have so far applied for selling battery-powered vehicles, only a couple of them, including Ecobikes, is currently into electricity- powered bicycles and scooters in the country, according to him.

Cynosure's present models, which do not require the Road Transport Authority (RTA) registration, are priced at around Rs 30,000 per vehicle. The company is also in talks with the Chinese company to bring battery-powered three-wheelers into the country, Rao said.

The new models claim to give a mileage of around 80 km with a one-time charging that consumes two units of power.