CHENNAI: German appliance-maker BSH Group said it’s looking to expand its reach to more than 350 Indian cities and will invest about 100 million euros in India in the next four years to set up a technology centre, a marketing unit and manufacturing unit for refrigerators in Sriperumbudur, Chennai.
BSH, which sells appliances in India through its Bosch and Siemens brands, said it is going to invest 50 million euros of the total funds in building a refrigerator facility at its 44-acre plant in Chennai.
The new unit will have a capacity to manufacture 500,000 refrigerators per year for India and the export markets, and may employ 150 workers initially before it starts production in 2021. “It is difficult to decipher a market like India that demands technologically up-to-date appliances at lower price points.
But the saturation of home appliances in India is quite low. We see about 30-40 per cent growth here, while the global growth average is only six per cent,” said Michael Schollhorn, COO, BSH Hausgeraete GmbH.
BSH had already invested about 100 million euros in 2014, a part of which was used to set up a facility to make washing machines in the plant.