Panasonic Appliances India is ready to expand its electric cooker production capacity in its Chennai plant, according to its Managing Director Hidenori Aso.

He was speaking at a press conference to announce a new range of cookers to mark the 100th anniversary of Panasonic and completion of 30 years in the Indian market here on Friday.

“We manufacture one million electric cookers in India now which are being made in our Chennai plant,’’ he said. Out of this 75 per cent are being sold in India, while the rest are exported.

When asked to quantify the likely investments to be made in India, he said: “I can only tell that we may invest in creating new capacity in the Chennai plant.’’ So far, ₹100 crore has been invested in India by Panasonic.

According to T Ganesan, Chief Factory Officer for Chennai plant, there is enough land and resources for the company to create additional production lines to ramp up capacity. At present, the capacity utilisation level is 85 per cent.

Panasonic has 55 per cent market share in electric cookers market in the country. About 1.5 million electric cookers are being sold annually in the domestic market in addition to over 5 million pressure cookers, he added.

In the last financial year, Panasonic Appliances posted Rs 250 crore revenue.

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