Tata Motors to move fast on small car project, tap Southeast Asian truck market

Mumbai: Tata Motors ambitious Rs100,000 car project is running behind schedule, but chairman Ratan Tata hopes to go top gear to make up for lost time.

"The project is getting delayed," Tata said on the sidelines of Tata Tea's 44th annual general meeting in Kolkota.

But he hopes there would be no delay in the project and the first car will be rolled out in the second half of 2008.

"I do not want to give the feeling that the project itself is getting delayed, but we will use our capability to overcome the delay," Tata said.

Referring to the controversy over land acquisition for the car project in Singur, Tata said that the project would lift farmers from a life of poverty. Tata also said that he would like to visit to Singur.

West Bengal, he said, had been ignored by the industry due to historical reasons, adding that Tata Motors had decided to locate the plant at Singur because the group believed that somebody would have to make a start.

Tata Motors Ltd is also setting up manufacturing base in Thailand as it expands auto sales in Southeast Asia.

Tata Motors (Thailand), a 70 per cent owned joint venture of Tata Motors, was considering launching a range of products to tap into healthy demand in the region, Ajit Venkataraman, chief executive of the joint venture, said.

The joint venture will invest 1.3 billion baht ($38 million) in Thailand to build up to 35,000 one-tonne pick-up trucks a year over the next 3-5 years, he said.

The new pickup trucks will be assembled at its Thai partner Thonburi Auto Assembly's plant in suburban Bangkok, with 80 per cent of the trucks to be sold in the domestic market.

The company will appoint up to 25 dealers when it launches products in the first quarter of next year, he said.

The joint venture, the latest investment of the Tata group in Thailand, where it has a steel subsidiary, Tata Steel (Thailand).