Yamaha inaugurates third manufacturing unit in India

India Yamaha Motor Pvt. Ltd. (IYM) has inaugurated its third manufacturing facility at the industrial park in Vallam Vadagal situated at the outskirts of Chennai, Tamil Nadu.

The new factory will be the first in the Yamaha Motor group to have a vendor park in its vicinity. Spread across 177 acres, the new facility covers an area of 109 acres for IYM and 68 acres for vendor partners.

The company signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the government of Tamil Nadu in May, 2012 to construct and operate the two-wheeler factory in the state. The new facility will join the currently operating factories of IYM at Surajpur (Uttar Pradesh) and Faridabad (Haryana) to meet the rising demand for two-wheelers in India. With the new Chennai factory and the company’s plants in Surajpur and Faridabad, IYM will have a combined two-wheelers production capacity of 2.5 million units by 2018.

On this occasion, Hiroaki Fujita, Chairman, India Yamaha Motor Pvt. Ltd., said: "We plan to invest a total of Rs. 1,500 crores in phases till 2018 when the new plant is expected to have a capacity of 1.8 million units.The company has sold 7.4 lakh units in 2014 and we are eyeing double-digit sales growth in 2015. The company is also targeting a significant increase in the domestic market share in the coming three years."

The vendor park has 9 vendors who plan to invest Rs. 1,000 crore and will employ around 3,000 people by 2018. The facility will bring together the production operations of main external parts suppliers, enabling complete synchronization of external supplier parts production as well. This system will reduce losses in the areas of production management and distribution to extremely low levels in the overall engineering and manufacturing process, and make the new production base a highly-efficient and profitable plant.

The Chennai plant incorporates state-of-the-art infrastructure and advanced technologies for Zero-water discharge and recycle/ reuse of waste water and maximum use of sunlight. The building is compatible to solar power system installation. All common utilities are located in the centre to minimize distribution loss and centralized management.

To begin with, Yamaha will produce the new 125cc Saluto motorcycle and scooters including new Fascino, Alpha, Ray & Ray Z at the new plant, which will have an initial annual capacity of 450,000 units. The plant employs more than 2,000 people currently and will have 3,900 employees by 2018, out of which about 40 per cent will be women workers.