The Hindu Business Line : French major Turbomeca opens subsidiary here

FRENCH turbines major Turbomeca has said it plans to gradually shift its entire turbocharger manufacturing activities to the just launched Indian subsidiary.

The company on Thursday unveiled its 100 per cent entity based in Bangalore; this is the company's only turbocharger unit outside France, said Mr Vincent Gorry, National Executive, South Asia, for the parent conglomerate SAFRAN.

Turbomeca Turbochargers Industrial India (TTII), set up with an initial investment of Rs 5 crore, will ramp up its activities from assembling CKD (completely knocked down) units to highly indigenised production for the local and worldwide markets, according to top brass of SAFRAN who were here for the inauguration of the facility.

Some 8,000 of its French-made turbochargers — diesel engine boosters — have been sold across the world for use in railway diesel, marine engines, diesel generator set majors and other industries.

TTII will initially assemble, sell and service turbochargers fitted on to the Railways locomotive engines. It will source components locally, assemble and test the next generation HS 589 NGT turbochargers in Bangalore.

The Turbomeca's Chairman & CEO, Mr Emeric d'Arcimoles, said, "There is a large and interesting potential market with the Railways and we have great ambition in India for turbochargers. The new set-up of Turbomeca marks an important step forward in the achievement of Turbomeca's strategies for international expansion through sites."

The domestic turbochargers scene is estimated at Rs 30-40 crore, dominated by Turbomeca, GE and ABB.

Mr S. Kumar, Managing Director, said the new plant has the capacity to produce 250 turbochargers annually using a wide base of sub-contractors and vendors in southern India. The company is making adaptation kits to increase local content from the current 48 per cent to 100 per cent from 2006.

The French company has been supplying turbochargers to its dominant customer, the Railways, since 1997, along with 35 other railway agencies around the world, said Mr Hossein Shaffiei, Commercial Director.

SAFRAN was formed last year when the state-owned aero-engine major Snecma merged with defence communications major Sagem. Snecma also has formed Snecma HAL Aerospace, a 50:50 joint venture to make the Shakti engine for the light helicopter.