Maruti Suzuki is preparing for a major production increase. It plans to go to 4 million cars per year from the current 2.4 million, by 2030. But the company does not want higher volumes to come at the cost of quality. Suzuki Motor has reportedly asked its Indian suppliers to stop their production machinery for one day every week for maintenance. The idea is simple: give machines enough downtime to reduce breakdowns, improve safety and maintain consistent quality in their outputs. In other words, ensure consistent component quality in Maruti cars!
This is reportedly the first time Suzuki has issued such a directive to its Indian suppliers. The Japanese automaker sees India as its biggest market and an increasingly important export base.
Suppliers Asked To Stop Production One Day A Week
Suzuki Motor President Toshihiro Suzuki met suppliers in India in August and asked them to plan their production capacity around a six-day working schedule, according to people familiar with the matter.
Maruti Suzuki has since asked suppliers to sign declarations by the end of the year confirming that production lines supplying components to Maruti will not operate seven days a week.
The company wants suppliers to move towards an operating model of 20 hours a day for six days a week by September 2027. This would give production machines four hours of downtime every night, along with a full day each week for maintenance. These are meant to keep machines and production lines in better condition and ensure optimum quality levels.
Why This Could Improve Maruti’s Car Quality
Running industrial machinery continuously can increase the chances of equipment failures, accidents and inconsistent product quality. These risks become more important when volumes increase significantly. Suzuki’s approach is aimed at reducing such problems before they even happen.
Regular maintenance can help suppliers identify worn-out components, service machinery and deal with potential problems before they cause an unexpected stoppage.
For Maruti customers, the important part is what happens at the end of this chain. Suppliers manufacture a large number of components that eventually go into Maruti Suzuki cars. Better-maintained production equipment should help the company maintain consistent component quality levels even when volumes rise sharply.
Maruti Is Preparing For A Huge Production Increase
The timing of this move is important. Maruti Suzuki has plans to increase its annual production capacity to 4 million units by 2030. This is a substantial increase from the current levels and will include both domestic supply and those earmarked for exports. India is already an important export base for Suzuki. Models manufactured here are currently exported to markets including Japan and Europe. The five-door Jimny is an excellent example for an export success. The made-in-India Jimny is in huge demand in Japan.
Maruti has big plans for the Indian market as well. It is expected to launch a series of new products here before 2030 and position itself better against rivals like Tata Motors and Hyundai. Even today, Maruti Suzuki is India’s largest carmaker by volume, and has a sizable margin with the second-sitter. However, its market share has decreased slightly in recent years. This can be linked to the influx of more feature-packed offerings into the affordable segments, where the Indo-Japanese carmaker has a strong presence in.
The future launches are expected to be of great help in regaining market share and strengthening dominance. These products will span segments and price ranges. Maruti Suzuki also has plans to speed up its production cycle, along with increasing volumes.
In short, higher production is one part of Maruti’s plans, managing manufacturing risks effectively is one more- equally important. Producing more cars is relatively straightforward if every part of the supply chain can keep up.Maintaining the same level of consistency while doing it at a much larger scale is the bigger challenge.
India’s Auto Component Industry Is Already Under Pressure
Suppliers in India are already operating under severe pressure. India’s domestic passenger vehicle sales have been booming in recent years, putting suppliers and component manufacturers under production pressure. The graph is predicted to move further up and touch 5 million units later this year. Back in 2019, the passenger vehicle numbers stood at 3 million.
The factories of many component manufacturers are already running at high utilisation levels. Maximising production and profitability in such cases can get tricky. Traditionally, many of these factories operate seven days a week. Suzuki’s new directive changes this approach.
The planned maintenance day could add to the costs for suppliers. They may even need additional production capacity to compensate for the downtime. Investments in additional machinery or manufacturing capacity may also be required. All these investments, however, will lay the foundation for a more stable future production system.