PMP Auto Components Pvt Ltd, a division of Ashok Piramal Group, has commenced production at a new wiping system plant at Satara in the Indian state of Maharashtra. The company has established the new factory to cater to the country’s growing car and LCV markets.
“We are supplying wiper systems for the Alto, which is Maruti Suzuki’s largest selling car. We will also supply wiper systems to VW for the new Polo, and we are eyeing the growing LCV market in India and gearing up to supply wipers to Daimler and to Tata for its Ace model,” S N Somani, PMP Auto’s chief executive told just-auto.
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PMP Auto’s other clients include Mahindra & Mahindra, Eicher, TAFE, New Holland, Simpson, Greaves, SAME and VST. The firm will offer complete wiping systems: wiper motor, linkages, windshield washer pumps and reservoir.
The new plant will cater to both domestic and foreign OEMs. The technology for the Indian facility was acquired from a PMP Auto plant in Prague. The company acquired two wiping system plants in Hungary and the Czech Republic in 2007 and 2008 respectively and subsequently consolidated these into the remaining facility in the Czech capital. The European entity hitherto known as PAL International has been renamed PMP Pal. It supplies wiper systems to Suzuki, VW, Skoda, Fiat, PSA Peugeot Citroen and Volvo.
The Indian plant caters to both the domestic market and exports components to the US. “We are supplying wipers to VW US from our Indian plant and supplying other clients from the European plant. But it has been realised that transportation costs are increasing and it is good business sense to have a facility in the US. We may set up a plant once we have a market of one million wipers,” said Somani.
PMP Auto is considering establishing a wiper unit in the US either through an acquisition or via an alternate strategy. “We would set up a plant in the next two years in all likelihood by setting up a Greenfield plant,” Somani confided. The Indian plant has the capacity to manufacture half a million wipers in a single shift while the European plant’s capacity is two million wipers.
PMP Auto claims to have a 7% market share of the wiping business in Europe and 2% of the world market. The company is aiming to be among the top five suppliers to global OEMs for wiping systems in the next five years.
