Bharat Forge, the flagship company of the USD 2.4 billion Kalyani Group and a leading global supplier of forged and machined components, has commissioned India’s largest commercial open forging press at its Mundhwa facility in Pune. The facility was inaugurated by Azeez M. Khan, Principal Secretary, Industries, Government of Maharashtra. 

The new facility, which has a large 4000T open die press, will produce ingots ranging up to 70 tons and would primarily cater to the Wind Energy, Oil & Gas, Steel, Power, Gear, Cement Ship building, Pressure Vessel, Petrochemical & Sugar Industry. Shafts for the Wind Energy & Power Generation sector, Well Heads & X-mas Tree parts for the Oil & Gas Industry and Pinion Shafts, Gear blanks etc. for the Capital Goods sector are some of the parts that will be manufactured at this new facility. 

Speaking on the occasion, B N Kalyani, Chairman & Managing Director, Bharat Forge Ltd., said, “Today is a landmark day in our company’s history. It marks a very significant step that we have taken into a new area of business – manufacture of critical components for the non-automotive sector. Bharat Forge in the last 15 years has successfully implemented a global strategy based on technology leadership and innovation, in its automotive business. We intend to replicate our successful automotive business strategy to attain a global leadership position in the non-automotive sectors”. 

“To support this goal, we have made substantial investment both in terms of capacity & capability creation as well as backward integration. We aim to provide our customers with value added service to complement their strategies and we will strive to maintain the pace of innovation.” he added

Geometric Limited, a leader in Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solutions and technologies, announced the signing of a contract with Ford Motor Company to provide production support and software maintenance work. Geometric will provide application management services (AMS) to Ford for production support of its engineering applications suite, which comprises of over 140 integrated applications. The management services will cover issue analysis, investigation, resolution, code fix, software vendor coordination, testing, packaging, validation and global release at various Ford Consumer Business Groups.

Commenting on the contract, Dr Ravi Gopinath, Managing Director and CEO, Geometric Ltd. said, “Ford is a strategic customer for us, and this contract represents an important milestone in our six-year relationship.” Currently, Geometric has a team of close to 100 engineers at Ford's Dearborn facility (USA) and the Ford Technology Services center in India, supporting various projects in the PLM space. 

The US-based Federal-Mogul Corp announced that it would set up a new facility near Chennai for manufacturing friction components for original equipment and after-market segments. The plant is scheduled to begin production of light vehicle brake and friction components, commercial vehicle and railway friction products by September 2009.

Federal-Mogul's Ferodo brand friction products have been manufactured in India since 1995, although the new friction facility will be the first in the Chennai region. The company will cross swords with two other Deming award-winning brake-lining manufacturers in Chennai - Rane Brake Lining and Sundaram Brakelinings. Federal-Mogul's wholly-owned subsidiary in India recently signed a memorandum of understanding with New Chennai Township Pvt Ltd to buy 10 acres on which it will build the 6,000-square meter facility. 

The plant will be built in three phases and is expected to create nearly 500 jobs. “Products manufactured at the new facility will be for both local vehicle manufacturers and for exports,” said Federal-Mogul President and CEO Jose Maria Alapont. 

Post the acquisition of Jaguar and Land Rover for approximately US$ 2.3 billion, Tata is planning a slew of launches. While the launch of the Nano later this year is expected to take centre stage, there are a range of introductions lined up, according to industry sources. 

The company, which reported a 14.4 per cent increase in revenues (net of excise) to Rs 6928.44 crores on a stand-alone basis for the quarter ended June 30, 2008 compared to Rs 6056.82 crores in the corresponding quarter last year, is expected to introduce the world truck and the Marcopolo range of buses in the commercial vehicle (CV) range. 

A small, 0.5-tonne commercial vehicle as well as a 1-tonne variant of the Ace (shown at the Auto Expo '08) is also said to be on the cards. In the passenger car and utility vehicle market, the company is expected to launch the Xenon pickup shown at the Auto Expo '08 and the new Indica. 

From the Fiat stable, with whom Tata has a strategic tie-up, the Linea and Grande Punto are expected later this year. In the current range, the recently introduced compact sedan, Indigo CS has contributed handsomely to the passenger car sales of the company. Tata's market share in the entry mid-size segment grew by 38.6 per cent during the first quarter of 2008-09. The domestic sales of passenger vehicles (including Fiat) at 52,450 units were however flat. The domestic sales of CVs increased by 15.9 per cent to 71,049 units

Ceat has appointed Sunil Sapre as its Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Sapre will be based at the Ceat headquarters in Mumbai and will head the overall responsibility of finance and accounts.