Yamaha has set its sight on making India the second-largest market for it’s two-wheelers by end-2017, and has set a sales target of one million units this year. Indonesia is currently Yamaha’s No 1 market with sales of 1.45 million units in CY2016.
If everything goes as per plan, Yamaha’s subsidiary company India Yamaha Motor’s management team believes India will ride past Vietnam, the current No. 2 for Yamaha with sales of 8,00,000 units in CY2016. In 2016, India Yamaha Motor sold a total of 7,80,000 two-wheelers, with 53 percent of them being scooters. This year, the company is gunning for a million sales, with around 6,00,000 of them being scooters.
According to Masaki Asano, MD, Yamaha Motor India sales, India Yamaha Motor should become the No. 1 in about five years. The company is likely to reach peak manufacturing capacity of 1.8 million units per annum at its three plants in the country. While the Surajpur and Faridabad plant in Haryana have similar capacities of 7,00,000 units each, the Chennai plant has a manufacturing capacity of 4,50,000 units per annum.
Speaking at the launch of the new FZ25 today in New Delhi, Asano said that India is the first and only market to produce this motorcycle. The company will, if needed, export this made-in-India product. Nevertheless, Yamaha is targeting export sales of over 2,00,000 units this year.