Tata Motors, the parent company of Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), today inaugurated a facility to assemble JLR products in India.
Located adjacent to Tata Motor's plant in Pune (on land formerly leased to Mercedes Benz for its production plant), the new facility has begun assembling the Land Rover Freelander 2. The vehicles are being supplied from JLR's Halewood manufacturing plant in Liverpool, UK, in Complete Knock Down (CKD) form.
Declining to reveal any numbers on the installed capacity or the investment, Mr Carl-Peter Foster, CEO and MD of Tata Motors, said that production could ramp up as well. The portfolio could be expanded to also include cars, depending on the demand.
Mr Foster said that with the acquisition of JLR, Tata Motors had become a global company while JLR could put to best use the engineering capabilities both in Tata Motors as well as in India. “There is an opportunity to source high quality low cost components,” he said, adding that sourcing had already begun.
“It is safe to say India has become an international location for manufacturing not only for the local market but for export as well,” he said.
Dr Ralf Speth, CEO, JLR, said “Our plan is to establish JLR as the most demanded brand in the Indian market.”
Last fiscal, JLR sold 891 units in the Indian market and had two dealerships. The company plans to have a presence in all the major metros and cities in India and expand the dealerships to 14 by the end of September 2012. So far around 100 units of the Freelander made at Pune have been despatched to dealers.
At present, the Pune plant will make two variants of the Freelander 2, the TD4 SE Automatic and the SD4 HSE Automatic. Both include a terrain response system, satellite navigation system and sunroof as standard features. The prices start at Rs 33.89 lakh ex-showroom Mumbai, against Rs 38 lakh for the CBU model. JLR has plans to increase the local content over a period of time.