Indian auto component manufacturer Ashok Minda Group plans to set up new manufacturing facility in Uzbekistan. The raw material for the upcoming plant in Uzbekistan will be shipped from India which will include key inputs like steel and plastic as they can be sourced cheaply from India.
The company shall invest $25 million in the Russian and CIS markets where it already supplies instrument clusters like speedometer and tachometer and vehicle security systems. It generates Rs 70 crores annual revenue from these markets. "The high logistic costs make us uncompetitive so we are changing our strategy as we believe local manufacturing will make us competitive," group chairman Ashok Minda said. The company aims to achieve a sales target of Rs. 150 crore next year from the Russian market alone.
Apart from units in India, the group presently also operates two plants in Indonesia and Vietnam which were established to capture the South Eastern Asian markets. It already has a manufacturing unit in Czechoslovakia and three units in Germany.
