LMT India announced the start of its second state-of-the-art global manufacturing plant in Pune on September 6, 2013. With three acres of land and a built-up facility of 30,000 square feet, the plant is a highly integrated manufacturing facility that is designed to produce world-class hobs for the automotive industry. Citing the reason behind the opening of the new plant, S Venkatasubramanian, Managing Director, LMT India Private Ltd, said, "India is one of the world's fastest growing economies. In the year 2000, we were among the first international companies to establish a 100 per cent subsidiary in India. India has always been our key target place as the market is filled with great talent and skilled workforce."

Another major reason behind opening the global manufacturing facility in Pune is to establish a closer network with the company's customers and achieve quick turnaround times on the product side. "Precision tools have been playing a key role in industrial production. At the interface between machine and workpiece, precision tools increase the efficiency of manufacturing processes and often these tools make the machining of demanding new materials economically viable in the first place. The markets for tool specialists are also growing with the ongoing globalisation of industrial manufacturing processes," Venkatasubramanian added.

During the last 12 years LMT Tools has established itself in India as a supplier of precision tools. Its main customers are companies working in the car and commercial vehicle sector. LMT India also caters to sectors like windmill and aerospace industries. "A very important strength of the LMT Tools' network is its global service offering where the company operates with specially equipped service centres at sites in Germany, USA, China and India. Chennai is the administrative and registered office of the LMT Group in India. Five years down the line, LMT India would clearly be an important cog in the global scheme of things for the group and from a manufacturing perspective. We intend to widen our range of products that is being manufactured at our facility and are confident of substantially enhancing our market presence in India," Venkatasubramanian said.

Some of the niche products from LMT include hobs; line boring systems; plastic and composite machining; special tools for die and mould; heavy machining tools; and tapping, thread rolling and clamping systems. The company has invested Rs 40 crore for this facility. It will manufacture 850 to 2,000 hobs per month. This will mainly cater to motorcycle as well as all the major OEMs. LMT will export 60 per cent of its production to Europe and China.