Monday, October 21, 2013: If reports are to be believed, Canon India is considering setting up a manufacturing plant in India. This news comes after the recent initiatives by the government to set up electronic hardware manufacturing clusters in India and incentivise manufacturing.
However, the company says that it will not hurry through the decision as it wants the facility to also be an export hub. At present, the company imports 100 per cent of the products that it sells in India.
Commenting on the news, Kazutada Kobayashi, President and Chief Executive Officer, Canon India, told Business Line, “We have started checking the infrastructure opportunity and benefits. It is a very basic field study we are doing. According to our company policy, we are not interested in establishing a hardware factory (copier, scanners) only for the sake of that country.”
Kobayashi further added that though India is not active in electronic hardware manufacturing right now, but with the new government policies, the scenario is expected to change in the next 10 years.
He said, when the company decides to set up a plant in India, it will produce for the export market as well, particularly the West, the report added. He said, “For example, our inkjet printers’ factory which has over 10,000 workers in Vietnam does not produce products only for Vietnam, but exports as well.”
At present, the company is studying the infrastructure, parts, export and import leniency on parts and products, logistics and skilled labours.
“Logistics and quality of workers are very important, particularly because our industry is different which is known as precision machine industry, slightly different from other manufacturers such as bikes and cars. The Government aims to achieve a turnover of around $400-billion from the electronic hardware industry at an investment of about $100 billion and provide employment to around 28 million by 2020,” Kobayashi added.
