Rane Engine Valve Ltd. (REVL) strengthened its market leadership further in the engine valves segment by commissioning its dedicated line for manufacturing valves for Kappa engines of Hyundai Motor India Ltd., (HMIL) at its Viralimalai plant near here on Friday.
J.J. Shin, Senior Executive Director (Procurement and Supply), HMIL, officially inaugurated the new line that ramps up REVL's manufacturing capacity to supply valves for 400 Kappa engines a day, in the presence of the Chairman of Rane Group L. Ganesh, and senior executives of both companies. The REVL had already made an additional investment to increase the capacity of the new line further to cater to the requirements of 550 Kappa engines a day.
Terming the Rane Group's decision to start the exclusive line as strategic and timely, Mr. Shin said that the capacity addition was attuned to the more demanding customer expectations. The automobile market was growing rapidly and competition was getting tougher.
“This addition along with the output from the facility at the Alandur plant in Chennai should be adequate to service HMIL's valve requirements in the foreseeable future,” Mr. Ganesh said, expressing keenness of the Rane Group to supply parts from its other companies as well to HMIL.
He said, a significant part of the group's future investments in South India would be in Tiruchi.
In an informal chat with reporters later, Mr. Ganesh said that a new plant of Rane TRW Steering Systems would be inaugurated in Uttarakhand during the first week of March. It will be started initially with a small capacity to cater to the requirements of Ashok Leyland.
The Rane Group will shortly add one more line to supply engine valves for Volkswagen's production unit at Brazil. “Supply of parts to Volvo may happen in future. We are in discussion,” Mr. Ganesh said, responding to a query.
