 Piaggio has announced plans to launch Vespa, its Italian line of scooters in India. The company will be launching the Vespa LX 125 scooter by end of 2012
A plan for production and sale of two-wheelers in India was approved by Roberto Colaninno, Director, Piaggio & C. S.p.A. at the company's board meeting held in Milan recently. The first model to roll out of the factory will be the Vespa LX 125, which has been specially designed for the burgeoning scooter market in India. According to the plan, Piaggio will setup an all-new facility in India for manufacturing two-wheelers and it will be supported by Piaggio's commercial Indian subsidiary and leader in Indian three-wheel light commercial vehicle market - Piaggio Vehicles Private Ltd.
The total investment to setup the new plant is said to be in the region of 30 million euro for the financial years, 2010 and 2011 and the investments will be covered under a Three Year Plan approved by the company's Board of Directors in the meeting. The new plant has a capacity of producing 1, 50,000 units annually and it will be operational by the end of 2012 with the launch of the LX 125. According to the plan, the firm aims to sell 1, 10,000 scooters by 2015.
India has the second-largest two-wheeler market in the world and it grew at an average annual rate of 7% between 2004 and 2009. Last year, over 8.4 million vehicles were sold in the country out of which, scooters accounted for 15% of the total market share. The scooter segment has seen strong growth of more than 13% with scooter sales totalling 1.3 million units in 2009.
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