印度新兴汽车城:陈奈

Ford is here, as are Nissan, Hyundai, Renault- Nissan, Mitsubishi, BMW -- the list goes on.

I couldn't think of a better place to be right now.

The place, Chennai, South India. Ford India's top man says it's a terrific place to make cars. It's close to a port, the local state government is industry-friendly and the population well-educated. So Ford and other auto manufacturers are investing millions of dollars here, turning Chennai into a global manufacturing hub.

Last year, it produced around 1.5 million cars, more than any one state in the United States. Some call it a new Detroit for a new era.

Chennai is a small car capital of the globe. Seventy percent of all growth in the next 10 years, in the next decade, is going to be in Asia-Pacific and Africa, mainly China and India, right?

And of that seventy percent, it's also gonna be in small cars.

The world's top car makers say India is a great place not only to make cars, but to sell them. Most of the cars made here in and around Chennai are for the booming domestic market growing at about thirty percent a year.

Auto sales in India hit a record high in January this year. What's good for car makers is good for suppliers, too. A French company that makes plastic pieces for cars canceled plans to set up a plant in Pune, West India. It opened its doors last year, just down the road from the Ford factory in Chennai.

Our growth is, of course, directly dependent on our customers' growth and other car companies. Like if the Ford does well, we do well. Being here, we are very near to Ford. We are very near to Renault-Nissan and Hyundai, Daimler and so on.

To feed the auto business, a number of ancillary units are popping up in and around Chennai, changing the face of the city of five million people. Local business is booming. Employment is up. People have jobs and a new confidence.

Lata joined Ford just a year ago.

I'm proud of the culture and the diversity, the welcome nature. You know, they are making equally to the ***. So it's very challenging.

A challenge Lata thrives on. The auto sector is changing her city, she says. Chennai is not what it used to be. It's now a city of opportunity.

Mallika Kapur, cnn, Chennai.