Switzerland's Ambassador to India W B Gyger on Friday hinted his country is keen to offer outsourcing contracts to machine tool manufacturers in India even as he called for collaborative efforts between machine tool makers of both the countries.

Lauding India's liberalisation policies of the past decade, Gyger -- at IMTEX 2004 in Mumbai -- also stressed on the need for collaborative efforts between the two nations in machine tool-making sector.

The formation of the Indo-Swiss business hub in 2001 was a major step in this direction, he said adding, these steps would also help in increasing investments from Switzerland to India.

B S Minhas, secretary, ministry of small scale industries, referred to the partnership between the government and industry, which he said resulted in the formation of a 'highly-competitive' machine tool industry in the country.

Switzerland's secretary for economic affairs Davis Syz said his country needed to look for potential partners in countries like India that have hi-tech and cost-effective manufacturing capabilities to maintain and consolidate its position in machine tool segment.

The seven-day twin exhibitions - IMTEX 2004 and Tooltech 2004 - are expected to generate confirmed business orders worth Rs 3,000 crore (Rs 30 billion) and serious business enquiries worth another Rs 3,000 crore.