It took an investment of Rs 500 crore, an area of 115 acre of land situated 35 km from Jaipur city for JCB to come up with its single largest manufacturing footprint in India. The two new plants that were inaugurated recently by Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje along with JCB Group Chairperson Lord Bamford, when operating at full capacity, will employ around 1,000 people. Component manufacturing is already underway at one of the Jaipur plants and production of telescopic handlers and skid steer loaders for the Indian market will begin next year. The facility will also provide additional backhoe loader capacity from 2015.

Lord Bamford, Chairman, JCB Group, shared that despite the sluggish growth, the company consistently invested in India even during the period of global slowdown and financial crisis. JCB has till date invested 250 million pounds (over Rs 2,420 crore) in India, including Rs 500 crore on the new plants at Jaipur. Vipin Sondhi, MD and CEO, JCB India, reiterated that this expansion will bring in the much needed FDI in the country. ?With every machine we sell, we directly employ three persons. We have created six lakh jobs till now,? Sondhi further added. While no direct numbers of the number of units that will be produced from the new facility were revealed, Sondhi added that the company will create capacity as market grows. 

Graeme Macdonald, CEO, JCB Group, said that he was hopeful of the policy initiatives of the new government bearing fruit by second half of next year. ?JCB has a long history of investing in long-term global growth opportunities. Today?s inauguration of two new factories in Jaipur is the beginning of another phase in JCB?s growth plans for India. It is only a matter of time before the current short-term market concerns give way to the long term growth in demand for construction equipment that will follow as the wider Indian economy picks up,? Macdonald added.

JCB exports to 53 countries and the company aims at building higher capability for engineering-based products in India, which now accounts for 20 per cent export share of the company and also work further on training youths for skill development, in collaboration with the local authorities. JCB has 11 factories in the UK, five in India (including the two new factories in Jaipur) and other factories in Brazil, China and North America.

Speaking at the glittering ceremony, Amitabh Kant, Secretary, DIPP shared how India needed to make manufacturing at the shop floor fashionable to young India. He added that the JCB plants in Jaipur were in alignment with the key initiatives of the new central government including Make in India, Skill India and Swachh Bharat. ?These two facilities will drive the economic growth and prosperity in Rajasthan,? added Lord Bamford. Since it was founded in 1945, JCB has manufactured more than a million machines ? and 200,000 of those have been made in India. JCB India?s three manufacturing facilities include the world?s largest backhoe loader factory in the world located in Ballabgarh, near New Delhi (Haryana) and two factories in Pune, manufacturing fabrications and components - mainly for export - as well as state-of-the-art heavy equipment, including large excavators, wheeled loading shovels and compaction equipment.