Anu Anamika, India head of Marketing of Suzuki Motorcycle India Private Limited, told Xinhua on the sidelines of a media conference here that Suzuki at present exports motorcycles to Nepal and Colombia but plans to turn India into a main center to export its two wheelers to other countries as demand for two wheelers are increasing worldwide.

The Japanese two wheeler giant which has its factory at Gurgaon in the northern Indian state of Haryana shortly plans to open a research and development division in Rohtak in Haryana.

Suzuki Motorcycle India might also foray into the four-wheeler sector as it had entered into a joint venture agreement with leading Indian car manufacturer Maruti Suzuki but Anamika refused to reveal more details about it.

She was in this metropolis to launch its new two-wheeler Hayate -- a 112 cc petrol driven motorcycle meant for the mass segment.

She said the company had already received bookings for 10,000 motorcycles a month and hopes this particular two-wheeler would capture 8 percent of the market share. Suzuki Motorcycle at present holds 22 percent market share in India in the scooter segment and only 2 percent in the motorcycle segment but she hoped within three years the mass segment motorcycle like Hayate will capture 8 to 10 percent.

Anamika added that the mass segment motorcycle market in India is 62 percent but was likely to increase as more and more people particularly in rural areas prefer two-wheelers compared with cars.

India also has a market for high priced motorcycles which are priced between 800,000 to 1.5 milion rupees (16,000 to 30,000 U.S. dollars) and are directly imported from Japan but only one is sold in a month on average though the demand is increasing, she said.