Michelin: Michelin to lay foundation stone for passenger car tyre facility at TN plant

French tyre maker Michelin is investing Rs 564 crore in its plant near Chennai to add a passenger car tyre manufacturing facility, as part of a strategy to enhance its strategic presence in the Indian market, the company’s top executives told ET.

The foundation stone for the brownfield manufacturing facility will be laid on Saturday and production is expected to commence in the third quarter of 2025.

“India is a very big market and (there are) many Indias within India,” Gaganjot Singh, president and managing director – Africa, India and Middle East at Michelin, said. “We cater to the premium segment (and) we believe that we are achieving a critical mass in the premium segment, which is now going to grow significantly in the years to come.”

He said the investment decision for the Clermont-Ferrand-based tyre major was driven by several factors, including wanting to go “local to local” while also employing local talent.

“Additionally also, we stand for (being a) premium product and we want to give premium service or be closer to the market, provide our products when they are needed, where they are needed,” said Singh.

The new unit is expected to create 200 jobs in addition to the existing 800 jobs involved in truck and bus radial manufacturing, he said, adding that the company’s ‘Made in India’ passenger tyres would help it meet the growing demand from premium customers.

Michelin India’s managing director Shantanu Deshpande said that “from a value standpoint, the Indian market total is about $12 billion”.”And it is going to double within the next 10 years. So the growth we have in front of us for the Indian tyre market is phenomenal,” Deshpande said. “The investment of passenger car tyre manufacturing in India could not have been more timely due to the shift in consumer behaviour towards larger vehicles, with 50% of cars sold in India now being SUVs, and the improvement in road infrastructure.”

According to the executives, the new capacity will manufacture tyres for the Indian retail market with sizes up to 21 inches. The fresh investment is over and above the Rs 2,840 crore that the company has already invested in its factory near Chennai.

The current facility has also been designed with scalability in mind, to enable flexibility for expansions or modifications to meet business needs and market demands, they said.

Florent Chaussade, executive site director, Michelin India, said, “Our industrial footprint in Chennai is one of the largest factories built by Michelin in the past 10 years. This factory truly reflects our 3P strategy of people, profit and planet. When we talk about R&D in Michelin, it covers a lot of domains – material, tyres, IT, AI, but also machines. Some machines that we use in our factories are designed, created and built by Michelin. This will be one of the more modern factories in the world (for Michelin).”

Michelin’s Chennai factory has been operational since 2014, producing radial tyres for trucks and buses for both domestic use and exports. In 2020, the factory was expanded to meet the requirements of Indian defence mobility OEMs (original equipment manufacturers).