Hero's New Plant Will Specialise in Premium Motorcycles

India's largest two-wheeler company Hero has unveiled a mega Rs 5000 crore investment plan for the next 2-3 years. Over Rs 1000 crore will be invested in the company's new plant and global parts centre in Neemrana, Rajasthan, while the rest of the amount will be invested across Hero's overseas plants in Colombia and Bangladesh and upcoming plants in Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh.

The new Neemrana plant will have an annual capacity of 750,000 units and will initially manufacture motorcycles and scooters, though it will specialise only in high-powered and premium motorcycles in the future.

The Global Parts Centre at the Neemrana plant is highly automised and houses state-of-the-art storage, packaging and sorting systems. Hero is looking to double it's annual turnover to over Rs 3000 crore in the next 2-3 years and increasing automisation across plants will play a key role in the achievement of that goal.

With the addition of the Neemrana plant, Hero's combined installed production capacity is up to 7.65 million per annum and the company says it is on course to achieve the target of 12 million units by 2020. Construction of the Gujarat plant is expected to be completed by November this year and work on the factory in Andhra Pradesh will also commence soon.

Hero says it is targeting 50 per cent market share in the two-wheeler market and is eyeing a growing share in the scooter market. The company will launch a new scooter early next year and also has plans to enter Europe and the US in the next few years.