Rs 355-crore Plant to Churn Out 3L Royal Bulls Each Year

CHENNAI: Royal Enfield, Eicher Motors’ two wheeler arm, has received the nod from the Tamil Nadu government to go ahead with work on a new `355 crore two wheeler plant at Vallam Vadagal in Sriperumbudur near Chennai. The plant is expected to have a capacity of three lakh units per annum.

According to sources, the iconic two wheeler manufacturer has been given the green light from the state government to begin work on raising its third plant in the state. The approval has come through the single window clearance instituted for the smooth processing of new industrial projects in the state, one of the key selling points that the state’s officials emphasised during the Global Investors Meet in last September.

The go ahead has come after approvals from all relevant departments in the state machinery, including the Tamil Nadu Industries Department,  the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board etc.

According to the approval notice given to the company,  the Vallam Vadapalani plant is set to be built with an investment of `355 crore. The plant’s planned capacity is three lakh units per annum and has an expected employee count of 1,000 workers.

While Eicher Motors did not comment on the development because of the silent period imposed before the company announces its results, the plant is part of Royal Enfield’s ambitious expansion plans announced in November last year. The Eicher Board had given in-principle approval for the plant and stated that the plant would raise the total production capacity of Royal Enfield to 9 lakh units per annum by 2018. The earlier announcement,  however, had not mentioned the investment figure for the facility.

The company had also announced in November that they were in the process of raising capacity in their two existing plants in Tamil Nadu - one at Oragadam and another at Thiruvottiyur, to 4.5 lakh units per annum by the end of the year. The additional capacity would come from the first phase of the new plant, Eicher Motors MD and CEO Siddhartha Lal had said.  Royal Enfield registered a 65% growth in the number of units sold globally for the month of January, 2016 compared to the same period last year, selling 47,710 units.