Alstom plans to make India global manufacturing hub

Alstom plans to make India global manufacturing hub:
New Kerala - Ernakulam,Kerala,India

[Business India]: New Delhi, Feb 4 : Global infrastructure major Alstom is scaling up operations in India that will see substantial ramp up of engineering strength as part of plans to make the country a major manufacturing and research hub.

The scaling up of operations comes in the wake of more concrete power projects taking shape in India, buoyed by the new electricity legislation that came into effect in 2003 and reforms in the sector.

"The new rules being implemented are bringing more clarity to the market, which will facilitate financing of the sector and bring stability to the market. Our investment here is longterm," said Philippe Joubert, executive vice president of Alstom and president of Power Turbo-System and Power Environment.

"India will be the number one country for Alstom investment after China. We are restructuring operations to reduce manufacturing operations in the US and increasing them in Asia, particularly China, India and Brazil," Joubert said at a presentation held late Thursday.

The official felt independent power producers (IPPs), including some overseas companies, are coming back on the scene as the fundamentals are much more sound than a few years back.

Currently in negotiations with several prospective power project developers including Reliance Industries for its planned gas-based project in Uttar Pradesh, Alstom is proposing to set up an engineering centre in Bangalore to raise capacity in research and development.

The Paris-headquartered company is also expanding operations at its Vadodara plant in Gujarat to take up manufacture of hydro equipment for the domestic as well as overseas markets.

Simultaneously, the company's staff strength is being raised from 2,000 at present in India to around 3,000.

"We have plans to add 500 more high-level jobs and take our staff strength to 3,000," said Joubert.

The enhancement of staff strength, particularly high-level, will see Alstom operating its Vadodara plant to a higher capacity of 900,000 to one million hours, ahead of even its China plant with 600,000 hours capacity.

Of around euros 50-60 million the company has been investing globally every year, the bulk has been focused on Europe for much of the last 10 years. But in the last two years there has been a shift towards China and India.

Alstom is looking to India as a potential export hub as its China operations seem set to be fully engaged with the booming domestic market.

Having come out of the red last year, the company has restarted taking orders. Over the last 12 months, the company has supplied seven large gas-based turbines to Thailand and Spain.

"In India we are in the final stages of negotiations with Torrent power generation company for supply of gas turbines for its proposed project of around 1,100 MW in Surat (in Gujarat)," the official disclosed.

"We are also discussing a possible stake in the Torrent project," said Krishna K. Pillai, president of Alstom in India.

Alstom is also looking forward to a time when India will be looking actively at the nuclear power option to bridge growing gap between demand and supply. The company is already working in this sector in China and is proposing to do so in France and the US too.

--Indo-Asian News Service .