Bajaj to assess Chakan plant expansion as demand picks up.

A slew of launches over the past few months have pushed demand for Bajaj motorcycles to new recent highs, resulting in the company struggling to meet demand, especially for its premium range such as Pulsar, Avenger and KTM series.

India’s second largest motorbike manufacturer is now exploring ways to increase capacity at its Chakan plant near Pune to meet demand, a senior executive told Business Standard.

The company launched three new models under the Pulsar brand (RS 200, AS 200 and AS 150), three models under the Avenger brand (Cruise 220, Street 220 and Street 150) which followed the KTM RC 200 and RC 390 launched last year.

All these high-margin products including Kawasaki Ninja, which are made at the Chakan plant, one of the three plants the company owns in the country, are witnessing healthy pickup in demand with the Pulsar RS 200 seeing a waiting period of more than three weeks.

'We need to assess if we should create additional capacity at Chakan,' said Rajiv Bajaj, managing director, Bajaj Auto said, “By January we should be able to reach a decision because my understanding is that we will need the new capacity by April'.


BS