VE Commercial Vehicles plans to tap auto PLI via electric vehicle route

VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd, a joint venture between Volvo Group and Eicher Motors, will be keen to take advantage of the productivity linked incentive (PLI) for the auto sector that the government has lined up through their expansion plans for aggressive foray into electric vehicles, said a top company executive on Monday.

Last week, the government had cleared the PLI scheme for the auto industry with an outlay of Rs 25,938 crore, slashed from the initial outlay of Rs 57,042 crore. The current PLI was expected to speed up India’s efforts to move towards electric vehicles at a faster pace. “Absolutely, we want to be part of it. We will look into electric, fuel cells and related technologies. The scheme does not say that the investments have to be in the same technology, the investments are open ended,” said Vinod Aggarwal, managing director and chief executive officer of VE Commercial Vehicles.

Through the scheme, the government was expecting fresh investments to the tune of around Rs 42,500 crore over a period of five years, giving incentives of up to 18 per cent for eligible investors. “This will be a boost to the entire sector as the government’s agenda is towards indigenisation of technologies. The incentives are attractive for players like us,” he added. The company said that it will be looking for the the opportunities and the tenders that will come out in the EV segment and is ready with a 9-meter bus already.  

The company said that following a strong pick up in economic activities like mining and infrastructure development, the sales of trucks are on a rise during the current financial year. “After a dip in sales of 40 per cent in 2019-20 and another 30 per cent in 2020-21, we are seeing recovery this year. We expect to be back to the previous peak of 2018-19 sales by 2022-23,” Aggarwal said. The company saw a two-fold jump in sales during August 2021 to 4,793 units as compared to 2,477 units during the same month last financial year. While sales of Eicher branded trucks and buses increased by 91 per cent to 4,667 units, Volvo branded trucks and buses saw a sales of 126 units during August this year, as against 37 units in the corresponding month last year.

To boost its presence in the premium segment, Volvo Trucks India, a division of VECV, launched six heavy-duty trucks under the FM and FMX range in India on Monday. “Our trucks serve in some of the most demanding and time-critical applications and these new range of trucks are built to push the limits of productivity with a strong focus on improving the driver environment and safety”, said B Dinakar, senior vice president of Volvo Trucks India.

When asked about the synergy between both the brands, Aggarwal said, “Eicher is in the mass market or value market and Volvo is in the high and premium market. Price of each truck in the premium market is without GST above Rs 1 crore. There is no competition. We can always adopt Volvo technologies in Eicher,” he added.