Rising mercury hots up AC sales in TG, AP

Hyderabad: While the sales of room air conditioner (AC) market in India is growing at 35 per cent, and at about 25 per cent in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, Blue Star Ltd is witnessing 60 per cent y-o-y growth in both the Telugu states. Buoyant about AC sales during an extended summer here, the Company is set to add nearly 200 dealer outlets and deploy an investment of Rs 100 crore each year to ramp up production capacity at its manufacturing facility in Sri City in Andhra Pradesh.

At present, Blue Star, a Mumbai-based AC manufacturer has 10,000 dealer outlets in its network across India, out of which 1,400 are present in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. The Company will be adding 500 outlets across India, of which 100 – 200 will be coming up in the Telugu states, by next year. The company is also ramping up production capacity in modules at its manufacturing facility in Sri City to reach 12 lakh units in the next few years.

“About Rs 100 crore will be invested every year towards the expansion of our 1st manufacturing facility in Sri City. The land and building is already present, hence the investment will go into the machinery. The production capacity at Sri City has already crossed 6.50 lakh units. We will be reaching nearly nine lakh units in the coming year. The plant capacity at Himachal has been frozen at 6.50 lakh units. Hence, the current total number of room ACs produced by Blue Star every year is 15 lakh units internally and three lakh units bought externally,” Managing Director of Blue Star Ltd, B Thiagarajan said.

The company has already invested in a second parcel of land located besides its 1st facility in Sri City. The construction of phase-one of Sri City-2 facility, spread across 40 acre of land, is likely to be completed by FY28, depending upon the growth and demand for room ACs, C Haridas, Executive Vice President, Sales & Marketing, Blue Star Ltd, informed adding that the new facility will support their room AC sales till 2030.