Celkon to invest Rs.100 cr in R&D, design.

Celkon Mobiles is planning to establish an R&D and design house with an investment of around Rs. 100 crore and employ 500 people on the facility. The choice of location is either Hyderabad or Bengaluru.

For the consumers, the move is expected to deliver cost benefit of around 12-15 per cent. 'We will be initiating discussion with our Chinese partner as well as with the governments', Chairman and Managing Director Y. Guru said recently.

Until it set up assembling facilities in Medchal, near Hyderabad, recently, Celkon Mobiles was a heavily import-dependent company relying on China. 'We do the R&D and design of our phones in China employing 130 people', Mr. Guru said, hinting that it could ultimately decide on Hyderabad.

Noida in Uttar Pradesh and near Delhi, which hosts several mobile and related units, is out of question.'Everyone says lets go to Bengaluru, I ask them why not Hyderabad,' he said.

On the Medchal plant, he said that the production was being ramped up to achieve 3 lakh units a year by 2016, which is 50 per cent of total sales. The company, he added, had recently graduated to making smart phones priced at Rs.3000 at the plant. Hitherto only feature phones were being made there.

THE HINDU