Finnish industrial crane maker Konecranes is setting up a 1,000 units a year plant at Jejuri near Pune after acquiring erstwhile domestic partner, Mumbai based WMI Cranes. This facility wills more than double Konecranes' capacity from 400 units a year.

The renamed company, WMI Konecranes India, will invest EUR 15 million into the plant, which will be operational by late-2012. In 2010, the size of the cranes market was at around 10,000 units, which is expected to grow to 20,000 units by 2013.

Mr Sami Korpela country manager of Konecranes India said that “With the demand expected to double by 2013, India needs factories and investment for cranes. All our facilities will now be concentrated in one location Jejuri adding that the pricing will be on a par with domestic players.”

WMI Konecranes is also planning to start a research facility in Pune. It has 100 people at its engineering centre, which designs cranes for project-specific applications. The company makes large electrical overhead travelling cranes from 250 kg to over 1,000 tonnes.

(Sourced from BL)