What are the various projects in the sector of railways and metros the company is working on currently in India?
Besides the ones under delivery like DMRC, Kolkata Metro and CLW/IR PJ, we are also pursuing many other opportunities coming up in the space of mainline railways and metros sector. Just to name a few Western Dedicated Freight Corridors (WDFC), procurement of semi high speed train sets, Ahmedabad Metro and Mumbai Metro are the projects, which holds potential for us and we are currently focusing on.
The company works closely with Indian Railways. Can you please tell us about some projects that the company has recently undertaken?
Indian Railways' initiatives like capacity building and modernisation are going to generate additional requirement for new age technology solution. We would like to offer our cutting-edge technology and reliable product to cater to this additional demand of Indian Railways.
With Railways Ministry's focus on bringing new age technology on their rolling stock, we believe Toshiba would have many opportunities on its way in Indian market.
Currently, we are working on technology up gradation project of Indian Railways for CLW on their 6,000 HP electric locomotive, which is a recurring requirement on annual basis depending on the production plan of CLW for that kind of locomotives. Besides that, we are also working with a car builder to supply our state-of-the-art technology product for new trains being procured by Indian Railways for Metro Railways Kolkata.
Please tell us about the state-of-the-art factories that the company has in India for manufacturing rail systems.
In our endeavour to expand our commitment to India and establish it as an export hub, we structured a new division in Toshiba Transmission & Distribution Systems (India) Pvt. Ltd. (TTDI) to create a new state-of-art production facility for manufacturing electrical equipment for railway systems. The new unit will manufacture power conversion systems and train control systems that provide overall operation management. Production is planned to start in April 2017, and will be expanded to match demand. TTDI expects the plant to have over 100 employees by 2020. New manufacturing base in India makes it possible to lower our production cost and to meet our "Make in India" initiatives. It also helps us in
expanding our business by structuring commercial network in local market. We will grow the new manufacturing base with investments FOR THE NEXT INDIA.
