Portion of Hyundai i20 production to shift to Turkey

By June this year Hyundai will shift a part of its production of the i20 to Turkey. The main reasons for this shift are -

1) The production capacity (~600,000 units per annum) of the two plants in Chennai is almost saturated.

2) The recent spate of labor problems in the plant.

What this means for the Indian consumer is that the waiting period for the i20 will now be around 3 weeks.

This move also signifies the Indian economy losing out a portion of its revenue to an Eastern European country, which have become close competitors to India, China and other South-east Asian countries in terms of affordable labor and raw materials for automotive OEMs.

What seems curious is that, Hyundai after announcing India as its small car manufacturing hub, should have considered capacity expansion in India rather than moving to another country. But I guess this will be the trend going forward, as Turkey has the advantage of being closer to the European market besides offering the same USP as India.