Maruti’s fully indigenous car will hit roads by 2011

Maruti Suzuki India plans to develop and design a car from scratch and launch a ‘Made in India’ model in two years. Maruti, which is now being developed as a global R&D hub for its Japanese parent, Suzuki Motor Corp, has announced significant investments in enhancing its overall R&D capability.

The company will invest Rs 1,000 crore in two phases to establish a full fledged R&D centre and a vendors’ park at Rohtak (Haryana).

The land allotment agreement was signed on Friday by Maruti Suzuki managing director and CEO Shinzo Nakanishi and the MD of Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation, Rajeev Arora.

The Rohtak R&D complex will house a R&D centre for passenger cars — including India’s first state-of-the-art test track with a proving ground, wind tunnel, crash facility etc. While the development of the allotted land and construction of the test tracks will be completed during the first phase by 2012, the overall R&D facilities will be progressively completed by 2015.

“This facility in Rohtak would be a big step forward in building the R&D capability of Maruti Suzuki, and enable us to offer superior products to our customers in the future as well,” Nakanishi said.

This complex will augment the full vehicle design and development capability of Maruti, thereby meeting the specific needs of the Indian customer. The first phase of this project will see Rs 400 crore investment by 2012.

Maruti has two manufacturing facilities at Gurgaon and Manesar with a combined manufacturing capacity of 1 million units per year.