Force Motors will spend around Rs.1,000 crore on anew high-end van, some variants of its sports utility vehicle (SUV) Force One,and refurbishing of other vehicles by 2014-15, a company official said Tuesday.
The Pune-based company rolls out vehicles ranging fromtractors, multi-utility vehicles (MUV), light commercial vehicles (passengerand goods carriers) and small commercial vehicles.
"Next year we want to be in premium high-end vansegment. The van will have Daimler technology. A production line for the van isbeing set up at the company's Pithampur (Madhya Pradesh) facility," NareshKumar Rattan, president, corporate sales and marketing, told reporters hereafter launching the new 26-seater Traveller vehicle.
He declined to disclose the premium van's actual seatingcapacity and the target buyers.
According to a research report by a broking firm, the ForceMotors has allocated around Rs.500 crore for the van project.
Queried about the sales of Force One, Rattan said the companyhas sold around 2,000 units since its launch last October as against a targetof 4,000 units.
"We are selling around 150 units of Force One per monthwith less than 20 dealers. We will be launching two/three variants inthree/four months to expand that segment," Rattan said.
Refuting that the company is now moving away from the smallgoods carrying vehicle segment, he said: "The small goods carrying segmentis witnessing increased competition. We will continue to be there."
He said the company hopes to sell around 3,000 units ofsmall goods carriers this year as compared to 5,000 units sold last year.
Asked about the company's plans for its tractor division,Rattan said the sales are going up and last year around 1,600 tractors weresold.
"This year we expect to sell around 3,000 tractors. Weplan to focus on six/seven states while develop upper range of tractors. We nowhave tractors in 27-47 HP segment."
Rattan said this year the company is planning to sell around1,000 units of the Traveller. "Next year the target is around 4,500units."
Force Motors is aiming a market share of 20 percent in thissegment. The company commands around 50 percent market share in the 6-20-seatervehicle segment.
The company plans to increase its network by 50 dealers to213 this year.