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Mr Takao Nakamoto, Managing Director, Daikin-Shriram Airconditioning Pvt Ltd, with Mr Rajnish Ohri, General Manager, Sales, before the press conference in Hyderabad on Friday.

HYDERABAD, April 26

DAIKIN-SHRIRAM Airconditioning, the 80:20 joint venture between the Japanese air-conditioning giant Daikin and SIEL Ltd of the Siddharth Shriram group, is seriously considering a proposal to set up a green field air-conditioner project in India.

Addressing a press conference on the eve of unveiling an array of air-solutions here on Friday, the Daikin Shriram Managing Director, Mr Takao Nakamoto, said the greenfield project to manufacture air-conditioners was expected to come up at a minimum capital investment of Rs 50 crore.

Stating that the plan for a green field project in India was part of Daikin's major initiatives to emerge as the leader in the global air-conditioners market by 2005 from the current level of third position, Mr Nakamoto, however, said the plans for the Indian market were currently being evaluated cautiously in view of the complex tax system in the country.

"We have been closely following the direction in which the Indian tax system was heading towards to judge as to when the system will be conducive for us to set up the green field plant. We are not comfortable with the complicated tax system prevailing in India with various levels of excise duties, import duties, local sales taxes and entry taxes by various States in the country.''

Expressing hope that the Indian tax structure would get rationalised over a couple years time, Mr Nakamoto said the Daikin's green field project would come up subsequently. Currently, the company has its assembling unit in Silvassa.

Stating that plans were on the anvil to introduce the entire range of Daikin's products in India over a period of time, Mr Nakamoto said they were keenly watching the Indian market for gradually expanding their business.

"For the time being, we have decided to focus our attention on central air-conditioning in the Indian market,'' he said.

According to the Daikin-Shriram General Manager (Sales), Mr Rajnish Ohri, having recently stepped up its production capacity at its assembling unit in Silvassa to 20,000 units per annum from around 12,000 units earlier, the company was gearing up to strengthen its marketing network in the country.

Daikin-Shriram proposes to expand its network to 75 cities and 350 dealers during the current fiscal year from the existing level of 31 cities and 253 dealers. New initiatives include setting up of toll-free service centres in six more cities of the country such as Hyderabad, Pune, Ahmedabad, Indore, Lucknow and Chandigarh, taking the total toll-free services centres network to nine.

It currently has such service centres in Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai, Mr Ohri said.

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