Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India Pvt. Ltd. has inaugurated its new technical centre at Manesar production facility. The new technical centre is a step forward in developing India’s contribution to global operations of Honda. With this, Honda aims to produce not only two-wheelers of highest quality with Honda’s latest technologies but using the material and the parts procured in India, for domestic as well as export markets.
To facilitate closer coordination and synergy of operations in an efficient manner, Honda Research and Development India (HRID) – a 100pc subsidiary of Honda R&D, Japan is shifting its entire two-wheeler operations in India to the new technical centre.
“The new technical centre at Manesar will have the mandate to approach all R&D operations with ‘Simplicity, Concentration, Speed and Communication’:
With Simplicity, Honda will utilise the local sourcing and production infrastructure with innovation to the maximum extent to create products that directly respond to the needs of local customers in India. With concentration, Honda will work towards reducing input costs by controlling cost of mass production parts yet maintaining highest quality on sourcing from its auto component suppliers.
With Speed, Honda will accelerate introduction of new models while successfully reducing the new model development time gap.
Communication and close coordination between Sales, Engineering, Purchase, Quality and R&D under one roof will lead to greater synergy and increased efficiency of operations,” the company said in a statement.
Speaking on this landmark development, Keita Muramatsu – President & CEO, HMSI noted, “The new technical centre shall Standardise, Optimise & Synergise our ‘Glocalised’ approach in India with Honda’s cutting edge R&D capabilities across the globe and a deep understanding of local environment to give mobility to a billion Indians at a faster pace.”
Yadvinder S. Guleria-Vice President, Sales & Marketing, HMSI said “The new technical Centre is the latest step in Honda’s customer centric approach. With our approach of Operating in the present with an eye on the future, this will lead to faster introduction of new models with greater India specific technology and designing resulting in highest quality products yet at affordable prices.”
Meanwhile, HMSI has crossed 10 million sales marks & became the fastest growing 2Wheeler company in India’ for straight 18 months (April’11-September’12). In Apr-Sep period of FY’12-13, HMSI grew a phenomenal 49pc in comparison to the two-wheeler industry single digit growth rate of 3.12pc year on year. HMSI witnessed a significant 7pc point jump in its domestic market share to 19pc.
While the motorcycle segment sales in India has dropped 1pc in Apr-Sep period of FY’12-13, HMSI motorcycle sales have grown phenomenally at 64pc. Growing at healthy 39pc, Honda also increased its leadership in automatic scooter market, in comparison to 20pc growth of domestic automatic scooter industry.
Led by Dream Yuga, Honda has seen five-fold jump in sales in the 100-110cc mass motorcycle market from April to September 2012. HMSI has also claimed that Dream Yuga is very encouraging with sales surpassing 1 lakh unit mark in only four months ending September’12.
Looking at current enquiries and healthy bookings in both rural and urban areas, Honda has ramped up daily production of Dream Yuga & is confident of clocking 3 lakh unit sales in this fiscal.
Furthermore, Honda envisions India as its centre of global operations and is allocating maximum resources to develop HMSI as export hub and is striving to achieve further growth of its motorcycle business in Sri Lanka, Nepal, Latin America, & Europe etc. With the basic Honda policy of ‘Start Small, Grow Big’, HMSI will commence CKD exports to Honda’s new JV company in Bangladesh in 2013 end to quickly respond to the diversifying needs of customers.
Looking at the demographics of its valued customers, Honda is rapidly increasing its market penetration through adding 500 outlets & expanding its network to 2000 sales & service touch-points across India by FY’13 end. In addition to existing 5 regional offices, Honda is also planning 7 new Zonal offices in addition to the recently inaugurated zonal offices at Chennai, Bhopal and Ahmedabad which will help Honda in amassing local market intelligence, strategizing regional approach and implement faster. The company has expressed its confidence to grow at healthy 30pc and sell 27.5 lakh units in FY’13 over FY’12.
Keita Muramatsu noted, “In its relatively short journey of 11 years, Honda has connected, communicated and created for India. Honda’s rapid expansion to 27.5 lakh unit production in current fiscal has been possible due to overwhelming customer trust in brand Honda. Now, as only Honda in India, HMSI is committed to continue realising ‘The Power of Dreams’ of million Indians in future too.”