The Hindu : Hero Honda to import 400cc bikes

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Apr 26, 2002

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Hero Honda to import 400cc bikes

By Our Staff Reporter

KOLKATA APRIL 25. Hero Honda would import fashionable high value 400cc and above Honda bikes in to India. Kazumi Yanagida, Honda nominee on the board of Hero Honda, said while talking to newspersons at Raichak on Wednesday, that the company identified a small yet growing market for such costly machines in the country.

The modalities of import and the timing were yet to be finalised.

The company, however, finalised manufacturing of 200cc bikes in India by the end of this fiscal.

Though the expected prices of such bikes were not revealed, Mr. Yanagida said higher capacity bikes would be manufactured at Hero Honda's existing facility.

"In the first year we will produce around 30,000 such 200cc bikes which will consequently be increased to 50,000," he said and added that the company had already been working to expand the company's existing capacity of 1.4 million units to two million units.

Alongside, study is on to explore the prospects of a third plant. "It is not yet decided where we will have the plant and what we will do," Atul Sobti, vice president, sales, said adding "it could be either an assembling unit or a full fledged plant". The plant would require an estimated investment of Rs. 75-350 crores.

This was in addition to the company's annual investment of about Rs. 100 crores on plant and machinery.

On the company's export potentials he said negotiations were on to export bikes to Vietnam. "However, it is still in a premature stage".

The Hero Honda topbrass were here in connection with the launch of the company's economy model Dawn placed in the same category of Boxer CT of Bajaj Auto, its nearest competitor. The company at present targets to sell 10,000 such bikes a month.

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