Maruti to expand service centre network to regain market share

The company, which has launched several vehicles in the fast-growing sport utility vehicle (SUV) segment and announced aggressive capacity expansion plans, said it plans to open 1,000 additional service workshops in the three years to March 2025 to cover nearly all the 5,495 talukas in the country. It said an extensive sales and service network will enhance customer satisfaction and help regain 50% share in the local market in the medium term.

“Putting in place a strong aftersales network is a priority for us. This fiscal we will be adding one service touch point every day. We already cover 97% of the talukas in the country. The intent is to be closer to the customer to increase satisfaction as we go ahead with our expansion plans,” said Partho Banerjee, executive director (service), Maruti Suzuki.

In 2022-23, the company activated 310 service touchpoints, its highest-ever in a financial year. At present it has 4,500 service touchpoints across 2,271 cities.

Maruti Suzuki is likely to invest about ₹45,000 crore to double production capacity to four million units by the end of the decade to meet consumer demand in the local market and ramp up exports from the country.

It plans to launch a slew of SUVs and electric cars in the next few years, and would require incremental capacity to realise its sales plans.

The company sold 1.61 million units last fiscal and had about 41% share in the local market. In this financial year, it expects to outperform market growth of 5%-7% on the back of new product launches in the SUV segment to breach the two-million mark in total sales for the first time.