Just a couple of weeks back, MNAL had rolled out its first MN 25 truck from its Chakan Plant near Pune. In no time has the company announced that the production figure has crossed 100th mark. MN 25's Bharat Stage (BS) -II model is priced at Rs 14.99 lakh ex-showroom price. BS III version is also readily available while BS IV models will be available as per the customers' requirements.
Pawan Goenka, President, Automotive and Farm Equipment Sectors, M&M Limited said on the occasion, “The investment done for Mahindra Navistar trucks is Rs 1000 crore out of which Rs 350 crore was done for engine manufacturing while the remaining Rs 1300 crore was done on trucks. Work is in an advanced stage on the soon to be launched CNG variant. We have priced our product very aggressively and I think it is marginally higher than its competitors. Currently our installed capacity is 50,000 units for trucks.”
Even though auto sales numbers may be on the rise, the industry is facing a components shortage. Confirming this, Goenka added, "Whole of the auto industry is facing a component supply crunch in mainly three areas, tyres, casting and fuel injection equipment. The demand is soaring but the capacity cannot be increased quickly. Around 5-7 per cent of a decline in output has occurred because of this."
Mahindra Navistar also has plans to export the vehicles to the neighbouring countries, and some other as well, in the near future. According to the joint venture between M&M and Navistar, the trucks are for sale in all parts except North America including South America, Africa, Europe and Non-European countries and even designed for such markets. Mahindra Navistar is also looking forward to start producing left-hand drive trucks to suit the market and has planned to push the exports by the financial year of 2012.
The other variants from the Mahindra Navistar fold like the MN 31, 40, 49 and Tipper will be launched in this financial year. Mahindra Navistar has already set up a customer-centric network of exclusive dealerships across the country for serving the customers better. Moreover, the already existing network will be deployed for servicing the customer needs. From the already existing network of 50 MNAL dealers which is to be scaled up to 150, 60 additional LCV dealers (light commercial vehicles), along with 400 outlets of RSAs (road side assistance) will be increased to 900 within a year's time. MNAL will also rope in 24x7 multi lingual in-house expertise and a panel of expert drivers, trainers and trouble shooters at our headquarters.