Zoomlion Is Technology Driven Company
How do you assess India as a potential market for Zoomlion?
India is highly potential market not only for Zoomlion, but also for most of the major global players in the CE sector. The scale of developmental projects in infrastructure is very high for years to come, and the government has a clear intent to bridge the infrastructure deficit. For over a decade Zoomlion has been present in India with strategical tie ups with some Indian companies for variety of its products. Today we are deeply rooted in India which is a major business hub for us.
To what extent Zoomlion has geared up to tap the opportunities?
We are investing in India in a big scale not only to set up a production facility but to triple our workforce in India. In the initial phase, we have already pumped Rs 300 crores for a new facility spread over 40 acres in Pune to manufacture different product including tower cranes. This will considerably reduce the lead time and help us serve our clients requirements faster. By mid 2021 we expect to start the production. We have also spread our network with full-fledged branches in six major cities. We have been enhancing our support systems, and spares availability. And we are also in the process of tripling the manpower. We are very confident that we can penetrate deeper and increase our market share as we have excellent products which have already been acknowledged by the industry. For example, Reliance alone has over 160 Zoomlion cranes at present. All the major customers are convinced by the quality of our product and support team, our fast and efficient service backup.
What have been the growth trends in the last couple of years?
Our focus has been more into the infrastructure segment such as road and bridges, metros. There has been good demand for our product lines. Even in the last edition of Excon we were able to close a good number of deals. For example, we closed a deal for 10 piling from a single client. Of course there has been a lull in the market. Power projects, mining, realty sector were not that helpful as expected. Even though 2019 was not really good due to many factors we expect the demand to pick up really well in the second half. In short, the growth prospects were not that visible, but we are sure that the clouds of uncertainty will move, and at least for the next 2-3 years the growth will be really good.