Mahindra South Africa has opened its new training center in Centurion, Gauteng Province of South Africa. The facility is located near the company’s head office and has been set up towards supporting the business growth strategy in the continent. Mahindra South Africa, was set up in 2004 to ensure company’s foray in a key international market, and is a fully owned subsidiary of Mahindra & Mahindra.
The newly set up training facility has training bays that are fully equipped with two-post hoist, diagnostic and measuring equipment and a full range of hand tools. The training center has a working, sectioned examples of the Mahindra M-Hawk diesel engine, as well as manual gearboxes, automatic transmissions, a power take-off unit and rear axles. The training center is manned by an expert trainer from Mahindra India, supported by two local trainers. While most of the training imparted at the center are expected to be handled by this team, as and when new models are introduced by Mahindra & SsangYong , the trainers from India & Korea would also facilitate product & technology related training at this facility.
In a release – Mahindra SA Chief Executive Officer Ashok Thakur said – “Both Mahindra in India and SsangYong in Korea are intent on growing the footprint of their brands in the African continent and the training centre in Centurion will have an important role to play in training the dealer staff from other countries in the future,”.
Increasing level of technology in the products has lead to the need for ongoing training of their partners and dealers and the training center would help keep the dealers network trained and informed on the existing products, technology and new launches. The company already has a strong dealer network in South Africa supporting sales, service and spare parts. The company is also exporting its vehicles to to Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, Swaziland and Namibia.