Maruti Suzuki India Limited currently holds 50 percent of market share in India and nearly 80 percent in the small car segment. Every second car sold in India is Maruti which makes it India’s largest car manufacturer. MSIL intends to maintain its numero uno position in India even though there are a slew of small cars being launched in India in next two years.

In a bid to maintain its position, Maruti plans to increase its production capacity by at least 75 percent in next five years. It is already building its second plant at Manesar neal Delhi which will be ready by next March and make its production capacity to reach a million mark. Further phase of investments will be decided in January 2010, said Shinzo Nakanishi, MD of India’s largest carmaker. “Depending on how the car market performs, we would like to reach 1.5–1.75 million units a year by 2015,” said Nakinashi. “That should help us keep the 50% share of the market we now have because the total car industry will, by then, be around three million units strong,” he added.

This will be the second biggest investment by MSIL since 2006 when it announced an investment of Rs 9000 crore towards its expansion plans in India. Maruti already has 600 acres of land of which nearly two-third is lying vacant. Maruti intends to utilize this land to build plants that will build additional 600,000 cars. According to industry experts, Maruti will need additional investment of about Rs. 3000 – 4000 crores to plan such an increase in its production capacity.