Coimbatore: As part of its expansion plans to meet rising demand for elevators and escalators, global leader Kone is to start its manufacturing unit near its existing plant in Sriperumbudur in Chennai, a top official said today.

Commercial production at the unit was expected to begin by the middle of next year and would cater to the needs of the domestic market and also neighbouring countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, Kone India Managing Director Amit Gossain told reporters here.

The existing unit was also manufacturing components for modernisation projects in other Asia-Pacific markets such as Korea, Australia, Singapore and Malaysia, Gossain said.

With an annual domestic market size of 50,000 to 55,000 units domestic market size, the company had a 20 per cent share, particularly in the elevator segment, which contributed 95 per cent of the company business, he said.

Demonetisation and GST had resulted in a 5-7 per cent dip of growth in the sector, Gossain said and after initial hiccup, the industry started picking up and was expected to achieve a growth of 8 to 10 per cent this year.
On the budget, Gossain, here to inaugurate a new company office, said the major housing scheme announced and also to install escalators in railway stations would boost the industry.Kone was in agreement with IBM, which should help it to harness the potential of digitisation and innovate new solutions, he said.