"We are focused on the replacement market"

Font Size

Print

Feedback

Email

Discuss

These are some of the factors that are delaying radialisation.

Brand consciousness among users is rising. How is CEAT tapping into this trend? What’s your marketing expenditure?

CEAT is one of the most salient brands in the sector today. We regularly feature in top-of-mind recall surveys among customers. We hope to build stronger brand salience and relevance, keeping in mind changing demographics. The marketing expense has been 1%-2% of sales and will be stepped up.

What happened to your plans with Pirelli (Italy) in the truck and bus tyre category? At what stage are those talks?

We import tyres from Pirelli and sell in the domestic market in our brand name, that is, CEAT. Currently, our relationship is limited to buying and selling and it’s likely to remain that way.

Off the road is a high margin business keenly eyed by Apollo and JK. What are your plans for this segment?

OTR is good business and we have a clear head start in this segment both in the domestic and in global markets. We have built a good channel for this and we are ahead of competition on the learning curve in this segment. We have a huge basket of products that we have developed and marketed outside the country. Unlike selling through distributors and dealers, CEAT is completely customer centric in this business, which will ensure that we keep growing along with our loyal customers. The way India is poised to grow, additional capacity will serve the market well.

Though the export market has gone rather sluggish in the past few years, your earnings have improved. Will you continue to seek new markets as the cross-ply market approaches saturation?

Milking the cross-ply market will remain an ongoing strategy. Our export basket is also quite diversified. We are strong on OTRs as well. We are now focusing on non-truck categories. We are looking at diversifying our product mix.

The OEM market for car tyres is strong at the moment. You were planning a greenfield plant for passenger cars. When is that happening?

Our greenfield car production will be in the market within two to three years from now. We have started talking to some of the OEMs in the car segment on future association possibilities. We shall also look to profitably export our production as we have a good channel in place. Domestic replacement market will be another focus area through strong brand connect.