Apollo Tyres Limited has decided to set up a manufacturing facility in Andhra Pradesh to manufacture tyres for two-wheelers and pick up vehicles.
“We will be entering into a memorandum of understanding with Andhra Pradesh government in New Delhi on Thursday.
Currently, the tyres are being manufactured by third party. Now, we have decided to manufacture on our own,” said Neeraj Kanwar, Apollo Tyres Vice Chairman and Managing Director.
The new manufacturing unit would come up in Chittoor with an investment of Rs.500 crore, sources said.
On Wednesday, Onkar S. Kanwar, Apollo Tyres Chairman, inaugurated the Rs.90 crore R&D Centre, Asia at Oragadam near Chennai that would house about 1,400 employees.
This centre would service the product development needs for the entire Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa region.
Asserting that their spend on R&D has been on the rise since 2011-12 from 0.71 per cent of sales to 1.91 per cent in 2015-16, Mr. Neeraj Kanwar said: “We have made the investment for the future on high-end Original Equipment Manufacturers and ongoing electronics in tyres.”
Q2 resultsApollo Tyres standalone net profit dipped by 4.90 per cent to Rs.204.62 crore for the second quarter ended September 30, 2016 against Rs.215.18 crore for the corresponding year-ago period. The total income from operations contracted to Rs.2,302.89 crore from Rs.2,521.43 crore from a year earlier.
