NBC Bearings, a brand of National Engineering Industries Ltd. (NEIL), is the largest producer and exporter of bearings in India. The company which has very strong presence in the domestic CV segment, is stepping on the pedal to increase its share of business from overseas markets.
Talking exclusively to MOTORINDIA at the IAA Commercial Vehicles show in Hanover, a senior business executive from NEIL says: “The markets are looking up both in Europe and the US. This has been one of the best years (in terms of global market performance); everyone is talking about expanding capacity, starting new projects, adding products – there has been lot more action this year which is far bigger and better in scale compared to the last two years. Our business from overseas markets currently contributes over 20 per cent to our total turnover – this includes our railway exports; we are trying to reach 30 per cent in the next three years. It will be quite an interesting challenge since the Indian market is also growing.”
Commenting on his experience at the world’s largest CV fair, the spokesperson shares: “Our experience here has been phenomenal; this is a very structured event and considering the exposure and presence we have in the CV space, as seen from our customer portfolio, this becomes a meet & greet place for us and our existing and potential OEM customers. We have consistently been here and intend to continue participating in the coming years too.”
The company was displaying its products at the IAA for the third edition running and had clear target customers to reach out to, apart from connecting with existing customers.
“Our main target segment remains HCVs; we had some specific customers to approach and had good discussions with them. We have announced an imminent capacity expansion and are trying to finalize the share of the new capacity to be used by our different customers. Though our focus here at the show is mainly on truck OEMs, our European strategy includes catering to both truck OEMs and the major tier-I suppliers who are into axles, transfer cases, wheel-ends, etc.”, he explains.
NEIL caters to all major OEMs in the Indian CV market including Tata Motors, Ashok Leyland, DICV and Volvo-Eicher. On the export front, it supplies to all plant locations of Daimler and many other OEMs across the globe. As far as the tier-I space is concerned, most of NEIL’s customers are from the US market, many of whom make hub assemblies. The company is also working with a number of tier-Is in the Indian market and is in discussion with leading players in Europe as well.
Over the years, NBC has evolved more as an OEM-centric brand with comparatively lesser presence in the aftermarket segment. While the company plans to maintain its focus on the OEM space, it also plans to slowly but steadily step up its presence in the aftermarket.
“For us to enter into the aftermarket, we need consistent efforts on offering a complete range of products, even some of them which we do not offer the OEMs. We have decided that our energy would be more focused towards the OEMs with the aftermarket being a by-product of our OEM strategy. Though aftermarket sales currently account for only less than 10 per cent of our exports, we will continue to put in efforts to improve this share because the aftermarket brings stability and can help de-risk our export business”, he signs off.