Force Motors, known for its Traveller and Trax commercial vehicles, has embarked upon expanding the personal vehicles portfolio with new variants. The company recently rolled out two variants of its SUV Force One ? SX and EX. The launches were an follow up of its first launch in 2011, marking the entry to that segment. Next month, it is coming up with new four-wheel drive LX variant of the One, thereby enlarging One basket to a total of seven variants. Force Motors MD Prasan Firodia in an exclusive interview with Sajan C Kumar said that the segments where the company is operating have not been impacted by the slowdown and that it also plans to launch a multi-purpose vehicle under the licence agreement with Mercedes Benz by 2015. Edited excerpts:
You have set an ambitious target of achieving a turnover of Rs 10,000 crore in another five years. What are your plans towards this?
Obviously with new products and variants. Out Traveller segment has been growing substantially with market share of close to 50%. Due to this segment, our first quarter results have been fairly good. Parallely, we have been expanding our SUV platform with the recent launch of two variants. The company will also roll out a new four-wheel drive LX variant next month. We will also do the retail launch of the off-road vehicle Gurkha by September. So in a very short span from now, we will have seven variants of Force One, which will give customers options to choose from.
The company will be closing the current fiscal with around Rs 3,000-crore turnover. We will also be launching a new multi-purpose vehicle (MPV) with licence agreement with Mercedes. The proposed MPV will be produced at the company?s Pithampura facility in Madhya Pradesh. The company expects to launch the vehicle by 2015. These products, coupled with engine supplies to Mercedes Benz, will make the company achieve the target.
What has been your experience in the personal vehicle segment ?
When we entered the segment it was entirely a new experience. It was both exciting and challenging, because this segment was very different from where we were operating. The pre-buying and post -buying expectations of a customer in this segment were totally different from those of commercial vehicle buyers. We had only one product and one variant, the only options we were giving were on colours. We had only 13 dealers across the country then, but now we have 25 dealers for our SUVs. The company plans to ramp up the dealer network to 50 by the end of the current fiscal. We have sold close to 2,500 units of SUV since the launch. The facility has the capacity of 12,000 units per annum, which can be doubled if needs arises.
What will be the focus?
All our products, for instance our agricultural vehicles (tractors) category, will see a big boost this year. We are planning to launch two small tractor variants by the end of this year. All the new products we are planning will allow us to play into newer markets. Large size SUVs will be our main focus. The company did not want to get into the compact SUV segment as there were enough players. We also have our focus set on R&D activities. The R&D segment has been closely engaged with Lotus of UK for technological know-how. We have set up an engineering technology centre at Pune at an investment of Rs 70 crore that will be opened next month.
How is your export market doing?
The company has identified certain overseas markets like African belt, Latin American countries and countries such as Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. We are building network in these countries by appointing dealers.
We are also bringing out country specific vehicles where certain norms and requirements are in play. Wherever specific development and application are needed we adopt these to our vehicles. According to the nature of the market we forge local tie-ups or go solo in those overseas markets. Close to 10% of revenue has been from our export markets.
Any fund raising plans for capex this year?
Ours is a debt-free company and, hence, there was no need to borrow. As for capex plan, we have been executing a R1,000-crore investment plan announced last year. The plan is for a total of three years and, therefore, extends to this year and next year as well.