Bajaj Auto Limited

The Bajaj Group was formed in the initial days of India's independence. It was founded by Jamnalal Bajaj who was an ardent follower of Mahatma Gandhi. In 1942, Jamnalal Bajaj was succeeded by his eldest son, Kamalnayan. In 1947, Kamalnayan consolidated and diversified the Bajaj Auto Group by bringing into cement, Ayurvedic medicines, electrical equipment, and appliances, as well as scooters.

M/s Bachraj Trading Limited was formed on November 29, 1945, as a forerunner to Bajaj Auto. It began selling imported two and three-wheeler vehicles in 1948 and obtained the licence to manufacturing from the government 11 years later. The next year, in 1960, Bajaj Auto became a public limited company.

In 1960, at a small age of 22, Rahul Bajaj became the Indian licensee for the make and thereafter, Bajaj Auto began producing its first two-wheelers starting from the next year. He became the group's Chief Executive Officer in 1968 after completing his MBA from Harvard. The annual turnover of the company was Rs. 72 million at that time. By 1970, the company had produced 100,000 vehicles. The oil crisis further drove the market in favor of two-wheelers, much cheaper to buy and much more fuel-efficient.

The three-wheeler goods carrier and Bajaj Chetak were introduced in the early part of the 1970s while the Bajaj Super and three-wheeled, rear-engine autorickshaw came in 1976 and 1977. Bajaj Auto produced 1 million vehicles in the 1976-77 fiscal year alone.

Products:

• Bajaj manufactures and sells motorcycles (Platina, Discover, Avenger, CT100, Dominar, Pulsar, Platina, V), scooters (Vespa), auto-rickshaws (Bajaj Intracity) and recently low-cost cars.
• It is India's largest exporter of motorcycles and three-wheelers. 47% of its exports are made to Africa where Boxer Motorcycle is the largest selling single brand in Africa.

Subsidiaries:

Bajaj Auto International Holdings BV (BAIH BV) is the only 100% Netherlands based subsidiary of Bajaj Auto.

Mergers & Acquisitions:

• Bajaj Auto Limited acquired technology from its foreign partners: Kawasaki - motorcycles, Kubota -diesel engines, and Cagiva - scooters in the 1990s.
• Several new designs and a dozen upgrades of existing scooters came out in the years 1998 and 1999. These combined with a surge in consumer confidence propelled Bajaj sales records and it began to regain market share in the fast-growing motorcycle segment. 
• In late 1999, Rahul Bajaj made a bid to acquire 10% of Piaggio for $65 million. A seat on the board and an exclusive Piaggio distributorship in India were the conditions attached by Bajaj to this purchase of minority share.

Key Persons:

• Rahul Bajaj- Chairman: Mr. Bajaj is one of the most successful business leaders of India. He heads the Bajaj Group of Companies. He has completed his Honours Degree in Economics from the University of Delhi, a Law degree from the University of Bombay and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He has received many prestigious awards and recognition. Some of the most notable among them are 'Padma Bhushan' by the Government of India in 2001 and Alumni Achievement Award by the Harvard Business School. He heads the CSR initiatives of the Bajaj Group which include Jamnalal Bajaj Foundation and Shiksha Mandal, social organizations like Bharatiya Yuva Shakti Trust and Ruby Hall Clinic.
• Madhur Bajaj- Vice Chairman: Madhur Bajaj is a commerce graduate from Sydenham College, Bombay (1973). He completed his MBA from the International Institute of Management Development (IMD), Lausanne, Switzerland (1979). He has been awarded the Vikas Rattan Award for enriching human life and his outstanding achievements. Furthermore, he has been associated with Bajaj Auto Limited since 1995.
• Rajiv Bajaj- Managing Director: Rajiv Bajaj is a Mechanical Engineering graduate from the University of Pune in 1988. He then went on to complete his masters in Manufacturing Systems Engineering from the University of Warwick (1990). Since then, he has worked at Bajaj Auto in various areas like Manufacturing & Supply Chain, R&D, and Engineering, Marketing and Sales, and has been its Managing Director since April 2005.
• Pradeep Shrivastava- Executive Director: Pradeep Shrivastava joined Bajaj in April 1986 and took over as Vice President in April 2005 and became its Chief Operating Officer. He has been inducted into the Board with the position of Executive Director, w.e.f. 1 April 2016. He completed his Mechanical Engineering from IIT Delhi and obtained a diploma in Production and Finance from IIM Bangalore.

News and Facts:

• Bajaj Auto Limited launched the new Platina 110 H-Gear. It is priced at approximately 53,375 INR. This new model has a digital console with a new Gear-Shift-Guide, trip-meter & fuel indicator. The ‘Gear-Shift-Guide’ will guide the rider to upshift or downshift, depending on the combination of gear & speed at which the bike is running.
• Two-wheeler exports from India rose by 19.5% from in 2019 (January-April). Bajaj Auto, the leading manufacturer of two-wheeler vehicles in India, shipped a total of 14,50,766 units in the April-January period and saw a jump of 24.87%.

Corporate Social Responsibility:

The Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities of the Bajaj Group are guided by the vision and philosophy of its Founder, late Shri Jamnalal Bajaj, who embodied the concept of Trusteeship in business and the common good and laid the foundation for ethical, value-based and transparent functioning.

1. Education
2. Environment & Natural Resources

The two flagship projects for Bajaj Auto have been the Bajaj Education Initiative (BEI) and the e-Learning Project. The BEI covers 76 low-cost schools (a mix of private and government schools) in the Pimpri-Chinchwad area of Pune and supports them with infrastructure development and capacity building. The e-Learning project has reached more than 1550 schools till date- covering Maharashtra and Rajasthan. Both of these projects are implemented by Jankidevi Bajaj Gram Vikas Sanstha, our own NGO.

In addition, Bajaj Auto has supported school infrastructure development, vocational training for entrepreneurship, teach-to-lead as well as scholarships for meritorious students.

Bajaj Auto is also supporting Bhartiya Yuva Shakti Trust (BYST) in training 25000 young persons in Aurangabad and Wardha to create 1000 entrepreneurs in 5 years. Over 177 entrepreneurs have been created in the first 2 years of the project.

• Culture of empowerment
• The superior quality of life
• Employee friendly work practices
• Let's grow together