Skoda's Shendra plant to kick off ops from Feb 14

Skoda Auto India Pvt Ltd, which so far has been assembling semi-knocked down (SKD) kits from its rented assembling facility at Waluj, on the outskirts of the city, will kick off the production of its cars from its new plant at Shendra from February 14 next.

Skoda which will be launching its premium segment car Superb during March, also plans to introduce a new variant of Octavia during second half of February.

"From the beginning of January, we will be moving machineries to our new plant at Shendra. New machines will also be installed at the plant which spread over three lakh square feet. The plant is expected to be opened on February 14 and the first completely knocked-down (CKD) vehicle is expected to roll out during the last week of February," said a company official.

Skoda so far has been assembling SKDs from a hired premises of Siemens India in the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) campus at Waluj and the new manufacturing facility of the company will be Skoda's first and the only such facility in Asia.

Skoda which has its main plant in Europe, has a small manufacturing setup in Africa but the Shendra plant will be developed as its point of global sourcing, specially for the entire Asian market.

Skoda will invest over $56 million in the next five-seven years for consistent capacity expansion and modernisation of this manufacturing facility.

"This state-of-the-art plant will not only cater to the needs of the Indian market but also will be a hub for the company's exports and with the 15-year long tax rebate offered by the Maharashtra government, the production cost will be very competitive. Not only manufacturing but also all major applications regarding sales, marketing, despatch will take place from Shendra," said the official requesting anonymity.

There is another reason for Skoda to set up its plant at Shendra as it will be given the status of a special economic zone (SEZ) soon.

The units operating from any SEZ in the country not only enjoy tax benefits but also other infrastructure facilities and relaxed labour norms.

Skoda which is planning to launch its first small car, Fabia, during second quarter of the next year, is now working on the modalities of launching Octavia Automatic, a fully-automated car with auto transmission and gear facilities.

"This will be the first such automatic car in this segment from Skoda and will have lot of additional features than the existing Octavia models, Elegance and Ambient and also Laurin & Klement (L&K). The price of this new variant, however, is yet to be finalised," said a company source.

However, Skoda will retain all variants of Octavia in the Indian market as Octavia is considered as a successful offering of the company and with sales of 10,000 cars which according to company officials will rise further during the next one year with the introduction of new variants.