Daimler Trucks Makes India A Global Export Hub For BSVI Trucks And Buses

Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Daimler AG, Germany, offers a full-fledged line up of commercial vehicles in the Indian market. In fact, it also oversees the only Daimler entity worldwide which is solely dedicated to its home market: BharatBenz. A technology powerhouse in the global commercial vehicle space, Daimler has announced that they have enlisted its Indian operation to be the global export hub for BSVI emission compliant trucks and buses starting from 2021/22.

Now, Indian Commercial Vehicle market is poised to embrace the newer (stricter) BSVI norms for emission compliance from April 2020 onwards. These norms are fairly similar to the Euro VI making Daimler one of the few companies in our market to have an expertise with the required technologies for the upshift. That said, Daimler has already sold more than 1.4 million Euro VI compliant vehicles globally, something that has given them an advantage over their rivals here. To further their Bharat Stage VI compliance and expertise, DICV has invested INR 500 Crores for aligning the technology to meet upcoming norms. They have also tested the new tech for over 2 million kilometres. This has also meant that the company developed new facilities and over 1000 new parts, resulting in a rather impressive localization rate of over 80% on its products.

All this means DICV is fairly confident over the upcoming implementation of BSVI. As per Mr Satyakam Arya, Managing Director & CEO, Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV), the transition for BharatBenz trucks and buses to BSVI would be an easy affair for them. The company has already got the required BSVI certification in July 2019, much before the implementation by the April 2020 deadline. Shifting to BSVI and the subsequent investments in this regard has also enabled DICV to open up further opportunities in exporting fully-built vehicles, engines, and parts globally. DICV has enlisted countries like Mexico, Chile, and Brazil that will soon migrate to similar emission norms for this phase of export expansion. The timeline has been set for the year 2021/2022 once the concerned countries shift to a similar stricter norm, further strengthening India’s position as a global production network for Daimler Trucks and Buses.

On the Indian front, DICV is said to be ready to supply BSVI vehicles once the BSVI fuel availability is in motion. They are also expanding their dealer presence and are bringing competencies from their global experiences into their training modules for dealer partners. At present Bharat Benz has over 200 customer touchpoints across India. The BSVI compliant OM926 engine series will be available in the Daimler trucks and buses from Q1 2020 and the same will be exported to the aforementioned countries internationally by 2021/22.

This export market is already a part of more than 50 countries to which the Daimler Indian operations is exporting to from its Oragadam plant. Interestingly, DICV Oragadam facility is the only Daimler location worldwide that manufactures engines, transmissions, trucks and buses catering to as many as four brands – BharatBenz, FUSO, Mercedes-Benz and Freightliner.