Chennai: French tyre maker Michelin said India is more than just a tyre market for the company and is among the only regions where there's 'true potential for exponential growth,' a top executive of the company told ET.
The Clermont-Ferrand-headquartered firm unveiled its first made-in-India passenger car tyre on Tuesday which was produced at its factory in Tamil Nadu meant for premium cars, including SUVs, and will be available for sale in the first half of 2026.
The company underscored the importance of the Indian market as being one where it sees promising growth and plans to ride the growing wave of popularity for mid-size SUVs and premium vehicles in the country.
"We see the growth in the next 5, 10, 15 years coming primarily from India and so it's obviously critical for us to make sure that we keep building on what we have been doing since the early 2000s. Building into our capacities in production, also in our competence centers that we have in Pune on R&D, IT, AI and corporate services," Vitor Silva, president for Michelin’s Africa, India and Middle East business told ET.
Further, he added that India also will be an important hub for the company's worldwide supply chain. He said that Michelin would look to India to buy many of the 200 different materials that go into a tyre. He underscored the importance of supply chain resilience and said India will play a big role in helping build this resilience for Michelin's global supply chain."
"There's many areas where India today is a global player in terms of industrial supply chains," Silva said. "As an example, carbon black. There's (also) other areas in steel and chemical products where we could see India being one of the main players on our global supply chain."
From among its portfolio of tyres, Michelin is producing the LTX Trail ST, Pilot Sport 4 SUV, Pilot Sport 5 and Primacy 5 tyres at its Chennai plant.
The company said that the Indian passenger car market is growing and transforming. Better infrastructure, rising disposable income, changing consumer preference of growing Indian middle class’s desire for more versatile, spacious, and feature-rich vehicles etc are fuelling growth and premiumisation.
“With better roads, distances have shortened and expectations of performance and safety heightened. For Michelin, the focus area is SUVs and big cars with tyres above 16 inches, and the brand is very excited about the prospect of offering high-quality Made-in-India Michelin tyres,” Michelin India managing director Shantanu Deshpande said.
Michelin has been manufacturing tyres for trucks and buses from its Tamil Nadu plant for over a decade now. Last year in September, Michelin had announced an investment of Rs 564 crore to expand its manufacturing capacity at its Tamil Nadu plant, beyond truck and bus tyres to passenger vehicle tyres.
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Now, the company has made an additional investment of over Rs 100 crores for the expansion, bringing the total investment for passenger car tyre capacity to Rs 686 crore. This is in addition to the Rs 2,800 crore that was invested on the plant, which was inaugurated in 2009. The plant now has a total tyre manufacturing capacity of 54,000 tonnes.
The Clermont-Ferrand-headquartered firm unveiled its first made-in-India passenger car tyre on Tuesday which was produced at its factory in Tamil Nadu meant for premium cars, including SUVs, and will be available for sale in the first half of 2026.
The company underscored the importance of the Indian market as being one where it sees promising growth and plans to ride the growing wave of popularity for mid-size SUVs and premium vehicles in the country.
"We see the growth in the next 5, 10, 15 years coming primarily from India and so it's obviously critical for us to make sure that we keep building on what we have been doing since the early 2000s. Building into our capacities in production, also in our competence centers that we have in Pune on R&D, IT, AI and corporate services," Vitor Silva, president for Michelin’s Africa, India and Middle East business told ET.
Further, he added that India also will be an important hub for the company's worldwide supply chain. He said that Michelin would look to India to buy many of the 200 different materials that go into a tyre. He underscored the importance of supply chain resilience and said India will play a big role in helping build this resilience for Michelin's global supply chain."
"There's many areas where India today is a global player in terms of industrial supply chains," Silva said. "As an example, carbon black. There's (also) other areas in steel and chemical products where we could see India being one of the main players on our global supply chain."
From among its portfolio of tyres, Michelin is producing the LTX Trail ST, Pilot Sport 4 SUV, Pilot Sport 5 and Primacy 5 tyres at its Chennai plant.
The company said that the Indian passenger car market is growing and transforming. Better infrastructure, rising disposable income, changing consumer preference of growing Indian middle class’s desire for more versatile, spacious, and feature-rich vehicles etc are fuelling growth and premiumisation.
“With better roads, distances have shortened and expectations of performance and safety heightened. For Michelin, the focus area is SUVs and big cars with tyres above 16 inches, and the brand is very excited about the prospect of offering high-quality Made-in-India Michelin tyres,” Michelin India managing director Shantanu Deshpande said.
Michelin has been manufacturing tyres for trucks and buses from its Tamil Nadu plant for over a decade now. Last year in September, Michelin had announced an investment of Rs 564 crore to expand its manufacturing capacity at its Tamil Nadu plant, beyond truck and bus tyres to passenger vehicle tyres.
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