Maruti plans Rs 45k-cr capex to double output

New Delhi: Maruti Suzuki India expects to invest around Rs45,000 crore to double its production capacity to 40 lakh units annually in the next eight years, company Chairman RC Bhargava said on Tuesday.

The company will also take up suggestions by shareholders for a stock split to its board for consideration, he said while speaking at the annual general meeting of the carmaker. As the global auto industry strives for carbon neutrality, he said Maruti Suzuki will also deal with a lot of technologies, including electric vehicles (EVs), hybrids, CNG, ethanol-blended and use of compressed biogas going forward as it is difficult to predict what will happen in the next eight to ten years in terms of new technologies. In his address to the shareholders, Bhargava said the company has reached "two million production and sales in 40 years and is now preparing to add two million in the next eight years" while also more than doubling the turnover of the company in its third phase of the journey.

"The era before us is going to be a very uncertain era, a very challenging era. Putting up these 2 million cars itself will cost us something close to Rs 45,000 crore. It depends how inflation goes but at the moment we estimate the cost about Rs 45,000 crore for 2 million cars," Bhargava said. Under 'Maruti 3.0' the company is targeting to add another 20 lakh units production capacity with about 28 different models in the market by FY 2030-31. He had earlier told the shareholders in the company's annual report that "our first phase was when we were a public enterprise.