Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) has joined hands with Chevron, the US oil giant to manufacture and distribute Chevron’s Caltex brand lubricants in India. This is history coming full circle as well, as HPCL was formed through the nationalisation of Indian arms of multiple oil companies, one of which was Caltex!
Amit Garg, Director of Marketing, HPCL, said, “We need to increase our market share and while we are already leaders we are not content with the kind of numbers that we have and we want to increase it by leaps and bounds in the next couple of years. And who better a partner than Caltex to do it. Because the premium grade, the technology they bring with their products is something the Indian customers are looking at now.”
Danielle Lincoln, Vice President of Chevron International Products said, “This (India) is a very difficult market to get into just coming in by ourselves but we looked at it and said if we could come in with a strong partner then there is a way for us to get into the market and bring some of the benefits of our products to the market. That is one of the reasons that we were looking for a strong partner and HPCL was willing to take us on as a partner.”
Caltex itself is a company that has existed for more than 80 years, and some of the premium brands under its umbrella are Havoline and Delo – the former is targeted at passenger cars while the latter is oriented more towards commercial vehicles. HPCL will be responsible for manufacturing, distribution and marketing of all these products in India. HPCL will be manufacturing these products at its plant in Silvassa.
