Mahindra Truck: "Our Competency Lies in Delivering Strong Value for Money, Products & Widespread Reach"
What is the growth potential of Tipper Truck market in the coming years amid the government's strong commitment of developing infrastructure construction?
There is a strong growth potential of tippers. With government's focus on infrastructure, several new projects are lined up for investment which in turn will spur demand for Tipper & other construction related industries. In the long-term we see this demand growth in range of 15 ~ 17%.
Looking at the current status of the country's construction, logistic and mining industry, we do foresee the growth of Tipper truck manufacturing industry at a steady pace. While the current scenario is depressing, the India story is very strong and progressive. Tipper sales fell by around 28% to 45375 units (FY13) compared to 62,762 units (FY12) in the previous year for MHCV segment. This has put pressures on operating margins & resulted in idle capacities. However it's considered as a passing phase & long-term growth perspective still remains positive. Also, the silver lining so far has been that credit availability continues to remain stable. Tipper sales are bound to come back due to partial release of on-hold Infrastructure projects, as road construction and mining is being opened.
How do you see the impact of recent Supreme Court decision to revoke 214 mining licenses on the mining sector in general and on the commercial vehicle biz in particular which is already under pressure?
The impact is on both-line up of new projects and also on existing population of vehicles.
The overall sentiments have been impacted with this ban, thus affecting immediate sales of commercial vehicles. The orders which were due for delivery got cancelled leading to inventory pile up.
For existing vehicles, overall availability of load has decreased, thus impacting the revenue potential of trucks and hurting overall cycle of business.
Indian commercial vehicle customers have evolved from operating basic tipper trucks to technologically advanced tippers. What are your latest advanced tippers offerings, their application areas and USP?
With changing operating scenarios & load requirements, tippers currently come with several advanced features. These features owe their genesis to the tough operating terrains & help translate into more value for money to customers.
Currently, we offer large number of variants on tipper platform to cater to different operating conditions & customer operations. Bogie suspension is one such feature which has become a standard requirement for tippers operating in deep gradients. In order to improve reliability & uptime, we offer 9 speed gear box which in turn translates into highest grade ability in its category.
There are several more features which are under introduction phase & it would be too early to elaborate on the same.
You are an Indian manufacturer competing with many MNCs, as they come with their developed world experience and proven technologies. What is your core strength/competence which gives you a competitive edge over others?
Indian CV industry offers huge potential for growth. Our core strength comes from our existence in this market for over 6 decades through our parent company. This existence gives us an in-depth understanding of customers & their approach to business. This helps us translate our offerings into most value for money products.
Apart from offering world-class products with an intention of delivering strong value for money products, our competence is also derived from our reach. We have quickly scaled up with 62 operational dealership & 1000+ touch points, with several more upcoming facilities. This offers us an advantage to understand different requirements and we are geared up to offer most suitable products & service to suit the changing dynamics of customer operations in CV industry.
On-site after sales support plays a big role while making a purchase decision; what are Mahindra's after sales/aftermarket offerings to motivate buyers?
Commercial vehicles are a source of livelihood & any breakdown translates directly on the EMI outgo. Our endeavor has always been to ensure that our product should offer the highest uptime.
As a new player, we have taken several initiatives in product design itself so that customer spends more time for earning on road rather than on break-downs. To translate our confidence into customer benefit, we offer (for the first time by an OEM) extended warranty scheme on our HCV product range.
Apart from this, we have bouquet of services offerings which are customized to customer operations & our products. First & foremost is Annual Maintenance Contracts (AMC). Based on the operations of customers, a customized AMC is worked out, which will eliminate the burden of maintenance of vehicles on customers.
As a new business brand, we listen to our customers and adapt our offerings and launch new benefits based on customer demand. We have introduced attractive benefits package some of which are unique and pioneering:
- The 5-year or 5 lac km warranty, which is a transferrable warranty and a first time ever within the trucking industry.
- For Tippers specially, we have launched on-site warranty and to pack it all, it has its most cost effective AMC rolled out.
- Offers such as up to 100% finance on Chassis and up to 5 year loan tenure.
In addition to that, we have Mobile Workshop vans and Mobile service vans with each dealersh to take care of various service requirements and onsite supports as and when required.
We also have 24x7 customer service NOW call-centre wherein all queries are handled by trained diploma engineers in 8 languages namely English, Hindi, Tamil, Telegu, Malayalam, Kannada, Marathi, and Gujarati.
Also, to further strengthen the network, we have added nearly 1598 roadside assistance points to our network and spares network of 730 retail points to further improve the reach for customers on important trucking routes. These trained mechanics have been selected carefully to build our presence on vantage points on important trucking routes so that immediate assistance can be provided to the trucks that are moving on these routes. As already mentioned above we have sold over 1865 nos. HCV Tipper Trucks pan-India.
Advanced technology tippers need trained drivers to deliver results. What initiatives have you taken to help your customers in this area?
This was anticipated right from start & accordingly we have taken several steps towards driver training. We have a dedicated driver training institute in pune. Regular courses are offered for retired army personnel so that they can pursue alternate livelihood. Also, our customers regularly send their drivers to our institute for updating their drivers with latest technologies.
Not restricting this initiative to pune alone, all our customers purchasing trucks have to mandatorily get their drivers trained before start of operations. This ensures optimum performance of our trucks translating the intended benefits to our customers.
Apart from drivers' education, we also have several initiatives to impart our philosophy of positive driving in drivers' lives. One such initiative is Mahindra Saarthi Abhiyaan for driver's girl child, with mission to salute the humungous efforts put in by the Drivers community in educating their daughters up to Secondary School, thereby acknowledging them as outperformers which came to a successful culmination with an Award Ceremony held at MTBD's Head Office in Chinchwad in Sept 2014.
What about your plans for participation in bC India trade fair to be held in Greater Noida? Do you have any plan to add more products to your portfolio or services at the show?
Our participation in bC India trade fair would be restricted to offering our chassis for display with reputed equipment manufacturers.
Published on:
10 December 2014
Published in: NBM&CW December 2014
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