Yamaha India rolls out 1 millionth two-wheeler from Chennai factory
India Yamaha Motor (IYM) Pvt Ltd on Friday achieved a milestone by rolling out the one-millionth two-wheeler to be produced at its Chennai, Tamil Nadu factory in two-and-a-half years of operations. The millionth two-wheeler to be produced at the Yamaha premises is a unit of the Yamaha Fascino. India Yamaha Motor has reached this figure on the back of good sales of its two-wheelers including the Ray Z, Ray ZR and Alpha scooters, and the Saluto and Saluto RX motorcycles. Yamaha had begun operations at the Chennai facility in March 2015 with an initial production capacity of 4.5 lakh units per year, ramping it up to 6 lakh units this year. India Yamaha Motor now aims to produce 9 lakh units per annum by 2019 at the Chennai factory and 7 lakh units at its facility in Surajpur, Chattisgarh, taking total production to 1.6 million units in two years. Yamaha recently launched the Fazer 25, faired version or its FZ25 250cc motorcycle. To boost sales, Yamaha has also been launching scooter boutiques in select cities of the country.
IYM deputy MD Riuji Kawashima said that the company would continue to enhance the production facilities in India to better serve the Indian market. Yamaha has so far invested Rs 1,300 crore in the Chennai Factory and plans to invest more than Rs 200 crore by 2018. Out of one million products manufactured from the Chennai Factory, 8.5 lakh units have been manufactured for the domestic market and remaining 1.5 lacs units for the export market including African market as well as ASEAN and Latin American markets. Yamaha Fascino is the most produced model with 3.7 lakh units. The production percentage ratio of the scooter & motorcycle production at the factory is 7:3 right now. The models with highest export numbers were the FZ series, Ray ZR, and Fascino.