The Nano Story
The Frontier Weekly, Vol. 41 No 49, June 21-27, 2009
6 Pages Posted: 1 Nov 2014
Date Written: June 21, 2009
Abstract
On the 23rd March 2009, the Tata Motors Company (TMC) launched its much publicized small car ‘Nano’ at Mumbai. The TMC’s strategy on the Nano draws a striking similarity with the General Motors' (the US auto major currently struggling for its survival) global production strategy in the late 1980s that was based on ‘simple and flexible manufacturing plants; global sourcing of automobile parts; rapid introduction of new models; and a lean dealer net work’. This strategy had shown success in Europe and it was introduced in Brazil in the early 1990s, with a goal of applying it in Asia, Eastern Europe and ultimately in the United States. Later Ford and other major automobile companies also followed the same model. In May 2006, when Tata Motors had announced its decision to start an automobile factory at Singur (West Bengal) to roll out the world’s cheapest car Nano. Tata Motors had abandoned the Singur project in October 2008. This brief history of Nano has taught people how a large corporate house could (i) use, to its advantage, the unhealthy competition among different states to attract large capital; (ii) effectively use the parliamentary politics as a business strategy to convert an internal crisis into an advantage. The paper concludes that most probably, Tata Motors will be back to Singur. It was abandoned only to be back again.
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