Minoru Kato to take over as HMSI President & CEO from April

New Delhi: Japanese auto major Honda Motor Co on Monday announced a top management change in its Indian two-wheeler arm, appointing Minoru Kato as President and CEO of Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India (HMSI).

The appointment will be with effect from April 1, 2017, the company said in a statement.

Kato will succeed Keita Muramatsu, the current President & CEO, who will move on to assume a new role as Executive Vice President, American Honda Co Inc, it added.

Muramatsu has been leading HMSI for six years. Under his leadership, HMSI rapidly grew to become the number one contributor to Honda's two-wheeler sales globally for the first time ever in 2016, the company said.

Under him, HMSI aggressively invested in 'Make in India' and expanded from single manufacturing plant in 2010-11 to four plants by 2016-17.

This in turn increased the total annual production capacity from 16 lakh to 58 lakh units in same period, it added.

Kato has been with Honda for 29 years and brings with him domain expertise from production control to motorcycle planning, sales across Europe and Japan, and South East Asia, the statement said.

He was the CEO of Honda Vietnam Co Ltd from April 1, 2014.