Yokohama, the iconic tyre manufacturer presently has a production capacity extending to 7 lakh units for passenger vehicles and 80% of this is presently used. The tyre maker will be expanding from early 2016 itself.

Leading Japanese tyre maker Yokohama is now planning a round of expansion at its Haryana based Ballabhgarh plant. The company has already invested INR 300 crore for the plant in 2014 and the next investment amount will be decided by December 2015. According to the President & Director, Satoshi Fujitsu, the expansion scale will be decided by year end and capacity could be doubled at the Ballabhgarh plant. Yokohama currently manufactures 5.5 lakh units at the plant while 1 lakh units are imported for the needs of premium SUVs.

Sales of the company increased by 45% over a period of one year and 4.2 lakh units were sold in 2014. The company is forecasting sales of more than 6.5 lakh units in 2015. The company is looking at an investment of 10 billion yen or INR 500 crore over five years with a view towards touching 3 million units of production in a year. This is the company’s target by 2020. Yokohama will be continuing with passenger vehicle tyres and is steadily foraying into the OEM segment too, for which talks are on with Honda and Toyota among other Japanese companies.

The company supplies to Toyota units in India through Japanese imports and is now looking at satiating company requirements totally in the country. The tyre giant is thinking of higher localization and bigger sales volumes in tandem with ramped up production figures that help cost cutting in the long run.