BMW India will be taking part in the ‘Make in India’ campaign in a big way. The company announced that now onwards there will be a level of localisation of upto 50% in all the cars that are assembled in the Chennai plant.

Mr. Philipp von Sahr, President, BMW Group India said, “The BMW Group has always looked towards India with a long-term perspective and our strategy is based on an inclusive approach. We have continued to build our operations in India in a systematic way. With a strong portfolio of locally produced cars, the time was appropriate to partner with major Indian auto component suppliers. This decision benefits BMW in terms of cost optimization and value addition while at the same time it creates business and profitability for our suppliers – a win-win situation.”

The BMW plant in Chennai started operations on 29th March 2007 and now comprises of two assembly lines. BMW currently assembles  the BMW 1 Series, the BMW 3 Series, the BMW 3 Series Gran Turismo, the BMW 5 Series, the BMW 7 Series, the BMW X1, the BMW X3 and the BMW X5 at the Chennai plant.

Some of the major auto components sourced for local production of cars at BMW Plant Chennai are: Engine and Transmission from Force Motors; Axles from ZF Hero Chassis; Door Panels and Wiring Harness from Draexlmaier India; Exhaust Systems from Tenneco Automotive India; Heating, Ventilating, Air-conditioning and Cooling Modules from Valeo India and Mahle Behr and Seats from Lear India.

Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar was also present at the event. He teamed up with engineers in the plant to assemble a 5 Series sedan using parts from local auto component suppliers.

BMW is going to launch 15 new models this year including variants. It is expected that the high level of localisation will help BMW price its cars substantially lower than before.

We also got a guided tour of the plant and got a chance to check out the various processes that go into the manufacturing of a locally assembled BMW car.