Sri Lanka’s CEAT increases radial tyre production to 600,000 units a year
Sri Lanka’s CEAT Kelani Holdings has reportedly announced a production increase of 84,000 radial tyres per year for passenger cars and vans, in its second expansion in this segment within the past four months.
The expansion will see Sri Lanka’s top tyre brand take annual radial tyre production to 600,000 – an increase of 16% over current production of 516,000 radials, and further ease pressure on supply attributed to Government-imposed restrictions on the import of certain sizes to conserve foreign exchange, according to local media reports.
The production increase comes with the addition of two more tyre presses and a tyre building machine at the CEAT Kelani manufacturing complex in Kelaniya, supplementing the two new tyre presses commissioned in March this year under Phase 1 of the expansion plan, media reports further noted.
Besides the volume increases they provide, the new presses installed under the expansion project are hydraulic, significantly improving the uniformity, ride and handling parameters and the overall aesthetics of the radial tyres they produce.
Commenting on this latest expansion, CEAT Kelani Managing Director Ravi Dadlani has been quoted as saying, “The CEAT brand supplied nearly half of Sri Lanka’s pneumatic tyre requirements for several years before the pandemic. The disruption of transport logistics worldwide due to the pandemic combined with the temporary import restrictions on certain categories and sizes of tyres, required us to accelerate production to help meet the domestic shortfall. As a result, we have increased radial tyre production by as much as 32% since March this year, which could be considered an admirable response to the situation.”
CEAT Kelani Holdings increased capacity utilisation across all its manufacturing plants last year, to supply the additional domestic requirements of truck, bus, three-wheeler, car, and van tyres in the absence of imports.
OSL take:
The increase in the company’s production line is indicative of the strength and growth of the country’s private sector. It is further pertinent to note that the development has taken place amidst the Covid 19 pandemic. Sri Lanka’s economic sectors have shown a growth momentum despite the Covid 19 pandemic. Also, the country’s economy has shown great resilience to external and internal challenges through the years and is once again on the path to recovery after facing the impact of the global Covid 19 pandemic. Given the growth shown by Sri Lanka’s manufacturing sector, foreign businesses/investors could explore opportunities in the country’s manufacturing process. These opportunities will further increase as Sri Lanka is poised as an emerging business destination in the South Asian region given its geographical positioning in the Indian ocean.
| Article Code : | VBS/AT/20210715/Z_7 |