Heavy duty vehicles in spotlight at Volvo Eicher, now

Bengaluru: With a 9 per cent market share, Eicher Trucks and Buses, an arm of Volvo Eicher Commercial Vehicles Ltd, is keen to grow its presence in heavy-duty trucks segment. While this segment of the company has grown by 25 per cent in the first half of FY24, the leadership wants to pursue a more aggressive growth than the 1-2 per cent market share growth it has been seeing every year.

“The commercial vehicle industry is definitely on the growth path, and we are expecting this growth will continue very very well,” observed Vinod Aggarwal, the company’s managing director and chief executive officer, who is also the present president of the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM)

Clearly, with an intent to capitalise on this positive trend, his company launched four heavy-duty trucks from its Eicher Non-Stop Series - Eicher Pro 6019XPT,  Eicher Pro 6048XP, Eicher Pro 6055XP and Eicher Pro 6055XP 4x2. “The new trucks are highly efficient as compared to the older fleets. And hence, the entire population of trucks including the BS3 and BS4 will get replaced over time,” Aggarwal informed.

He added that the trucks are specially designed for ecommerce players, car carriers, construction and miscellaneous loads. The trucks, he claimed, are designed to offer 20 per cent increased drivability (or uptime) to the fleet owners, saving both fuel cost (about 50 per cent cost of ownership of trucks) and fatigue.

Presently, the company has a stronger presence in the light commercial vehicle market, with a 34 per cent market share. Aggarwal contended that the brand’s buses too command a 24 per cent market share.

The automobile major has eight plants across Madhya Pradesh and Bengaluru where Eicher and Volvo brand trucks and buses are manufactured respectively, Aggarwal revealed, declining any near-term plans for adding capacity. On the manufacturing ecosystem in India, Aggarwal said, “India has to reduce its dependence on imports, especially for the sophisticated components including electronic chips and microprocessors.”

While geopolitical factors, higher interest rates and inflation continue to pose headwinds for the industry, high replacement demand and major infrastructure expansion in the country vis-a-vis its economic growth will lead the industry going forward, Aggarwal suggested. 

The company is working on various technologies and alternative fuels alongside electrifying its fleet, these include compressed natural gas (CNG), liquified petroleum gas (LPG), biofuels, hydrogen fuel cells and hybrid, to meet its decarbonisation goals.

So far, the company has over 425 authorised service centres, with 240 on-site support centres and 650 service vans spread across the country. It also has 8000+ retail centers for parts. It reported a growth of 13.3 per cent for both truck and bus segments in H1FY24 at a reported sales figure of 46,600 units.