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ZETOR - Traditional Czech Brand in India
24.09.2020
The traditional Czech brand which plays an important role in mechanization in India is tractor manufacturer ZETOR. This brand has a long and rich history in India. Czech company ZETOR has been helping Indian farmers since the 1960s.
While ZETOR boasts more than 60,000 machines that came off the production lines to help Indian farmers between 1970 and 1990, the future is no less positive when it signs a Memorandum of Understanding with India's largest small tractor manufacturer VST Tillers Tractors. ZETOR is starting a new phase of operations in India intending to create on-site production according to the Indian Government's Make-in-India program.
The brand's operations in South Asia have a long tradition dating back to the 1960s when thousands of Brno tractors began to be exported to India. Export cooperation was possible in the then Czechoslovakia thanks to the Motokov export agency, which began to develop the sale of goods abroad based on agreements on compensatory trade starting in 1950. Since the next decade, Motokov has focused on developing countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia, in addition to exports to developed countries.
The machines have gained a reputation for their high reliability, simple operation and easy maintenance. Also, in difficult conditions developing India performed very well.
Czech company Motokov also participated in the construction of assembly plants in several Indian cities. Since the early 1960s, it has been partnering with local producers in the form of licensing agreements or joint ventures. The first such swallow was an assembly plant built in collaboration with the Indian company Agro-Industrial Corporation for ZETOR 2511 tractors in the states of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.
Over the decades, the co-operation with other local companies such as Hindustan Tractors developed on the market, producing ZETOR Super 50 tractors, ZETOR 3011 and ZETOR 5011. This was followed by co-operation with the state-owned Hindustan Machine Tools, then India's largest machine tool manufacturer, which produced ZETOR 2511 models under the HMT brand license agreement. The success of the tractors in 1976 brought the expansion of production with more powerful models ZETOR 5911 and 6711.
Between 1970 and 1990, 60,000 tractors drove out of the gates of Indian factories alone. India is thus historically one of the 10 largest markets in the world for ZETOR. Parts and components for machine assembly came partly from Czechoslovakia and partly manufactured in local plants. Many Czech experts also contributed to the development of local production, supervising the deliveries themselves and the production process of the machines.
n 2020, it has been almost 60 years since ZETOR first entered the Indian market. Since 2014, it has been represented on the market by the subsidiary ZETOR INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED based in Chandigarh. The goal of the subsidiary is the entry of the Czech brand into developing markets in the region of Asia and Africa. The latest success was the entry of the brand into neighbouring Bangladesh, whereas, in other markets in the region, ZETOR GLOBAL RANGE series tractors are imported. These are several models of easy-to-operate mechanical tractors designed for the needs of local farmers. Other successes of ZETOR INDIA certainly include entry into the equally important markets of Nepal, Vietnam, Kenya and Zambia.
At present, ZETOR continues its historically very successful cooperation with local companies, when at the beginning of 2020 it concluded an MoU on cooperation with VST Tillers Tractors Ltd., a traditional Indian tractor manufacturer. The goal of both companies is to develop a new tractor designed primarily for the Indian market. However, the effort is also to find ways to export the new machine to other developing countries in Africa and Asia.
If you are interested to be in touch with ZETOR representatives please send email to newdelhi@embassy.mzv.cz.