Chennai
On Tuesday, the Hinduja flagship announced that it is the first local original equipment manufacturer (OEM) to meet this regulatory compliance for all its heavy-duty vehicles (Gross Vehicle Weight (GVW) 16.2 ton and above). This comes at a time when the auto sector has been grappling with slowdown blues, with most companies reporting south-borne sales.
N Saravanan, CTO, Ashok Leyland, sought to point out that downturns were part and parcel of the business landscape and the current economic cycle too will pass. As many as 35 heavy duty trucks were used to travel a distance of two million km in Chennai to “understand the nuances of the BS-VI technology.” Testing would continue for reaching the five mn km mark, he added.
A sum of around Rs 700 crore had been invested by the company towards the technology over four years, he said adding it will first seed its BS-VI compliant vehicles with fleet operators to get customer feedback. But, the challenge remained the availability of the BS-VI fuel across the routes and not only in the city. Small pockets on specific routes (such as Delhi-Rajasthan) were being evaluated in this regard.
The company has been shipping fuel daily from Mathura refinery for over one-and-half years now to test the efficacy of BS-VI-compliant vehicles. Pricing, however, had not been decided yet, Saravanan said.
Noting that many advancements had been done at the product level (heavy CVs) to enable ease of use of the modular platform by customers, he said there were mix and match options available for users.
Apart from changes in the cabin of the HCVs, the use of telematics for prognosis in the form of alerts on maintenance will be available in larger vehicles and for long-hauls. It is also looking at export markets like Russia where the opportunity to roll out BS-VI is viable.
On e-buses, Saravanan said it will be participating the second tender under the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric Vehicles in India (FAME India Scheme) for about 5,500 vehicles.
Sales dip by 47% in August
Ashok Leyland reported a 47 pc decline in total commercial vehicle sales at 9,231 units in August. The company had posted sales of 17,386 units in the year-ago month, Ashok Leyland said in a statement. The medium and heavy commercial vehicle sales stood at 5,349 units last month as against 13,158 units in August 2018, down 59 per cent. Light commercial vehicle sales stood at 3,882 units as compared with 4,228 units in August last year, a dip of 8 pc, it said
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