Indian Grip

February 22 (LBO) – Diesel and Motor Engineering Company (DIMO), a unit of Sri Lanka's Hayleys group, is boosting the visibility of TATA passenger cars in a market that is already dominated by another Indian brand, Maruti. DIMO opened a new showroom in a plush shopping business district this week, next to an existing outlet for Chrysler and Mercedes.

TATA already dominates the commercial vehicle market in Sri Lanka and DIMO has an estimated third share of brand new vehicles.

"Overall we hold more than 30 percent share for brand new vehicles," DIMO Director Gahanath Pandithage told LBO.

We sell about 800 vehicles a month. That includes all three brands we sell, Chrysler, Jeep, TATA and Mercedes.â€

DIMO is also branching out of the western province of the country which is the richest part of the country.

We are trying to do lot of branch openings," Pandithage said.

"We are already in Anuradhapura and Matara. Weâ€™ll be opening one in Kurunegala very soon.â€

DIMO hopes add passenger car workshops to the already running 24-hour mobile operations and commercial vehicle workshop list.

In the 2005/06 financial year, revenue from TATA passenger cars had increased by 35 percen