Sanand, the Gujarat town that gave a home to the Nano budget car when West Bengal threw it out, is humming with activity today.The Nano may no longer be a priority for Tata Motors , but Sanand has grown bigger in its scheme of things. One in every two cars sold by the company is now made there.It’s not just Tata Motors. Suzuki Honda and Hero MotoCorp operate plants in and around the town in Ahmedabad district, making the region a major automotive hub. Honda Motorcycle & Scooter’s facility there is the world’s largest scooter manufacturing plant. Before the success, Sanand had seen a fair share of distress as well. When the Nano output was dismal, Tata Motors had to let go of people.But over the past couple of years, the company’s workforce has almost doubled to 4,500 people. In order to meet high demand from the market, it started a second shift in January 2017. The facility is now operating at almost its full capacity.Over time, a majority of Tata Motors’ passenger vehicles on the new X4 platform will be produced in Sanand. The new architecture is likely to produce at least 3-4 cars with a combined volume potential of over 1 lakh units.Good infrastructure and willingness of the government to help the industry have encouraged companies invest there, said RC Bhargava, chairman of Suzuki’s local unit, Maruti Suzuki.Bhargava, who helped Suzuki setting up factories in Gujarat, said just like how Gurgaon has transformed into a mega city from being a village three decades back, the manufacturing activity in and around Sanand would transform the place into a major economic centre.“When Suzuki went there, there was no infrastructure, school, housing, place for shopping, all of that is being built now. In another five years the place will be humming with activities. Production for Suzuki is going fine and vehicle supply from the region is being produced as planned,” Bhargava said.If everything goes as planned, Suzuki will produce about 1.5 million vehicles in the state in the coming decade. And that would mean a huge amount of commensurate investment from the vendor fraternity as well.Ford India, which has committed over $1 billion investment in the state, is likely to cross a production milestone of 1.5 lakh units there soon. It uses the plant there to export cars and engines to Europe, China and Brazil.