Rajaram Krishnamurthy, VP — Marketing, Sales and Customer Service, Daimler India Commercial Vehiclesm on key growth drivers of tippers and dump trucks. How is the market progressing for tipper trucks and dump trucks in terms of production and sales? How do you see the demand for tippers and dumpers in the future? A healthy mix of construction activities, especially affordable housing and de-regulation of the mining sector with proactive private participation are reviving demand for the tippers segment. There is a strong uptick in demand for the long-haul segment of cement-steel besides, the sustained demand from e-commerce and construction space. Overall, we expect the heavy truck market in India to grow by more than 60 per cent in 2021, followed by 30 to 40 per cent growth in 2022 before stabilising to 15-20 per cent growth in 2023 and 2024. The market is on the recovery path after three down-cycles in the last 10 years. Which are the key growth drivers of tippers and dump trucks? The primary segments that drive the demand for tipper and dump trucks in India are the construction and mineral extraction industries. The increasing activity in construction, real estate and infrastructure that generate payload continues to boost demand for the segment. What are the key technology trends in tippers and dump trucks? Telematics is one technology that is certainly reshaping the trucking industry and BharatBenz’s ‘Truckonnect’ is an excellent example of this. A telematics solution based on Daimler’s global platform ‘Truckonnect’ is provided as a standard feature in all BharatBenz trucks. Truckonnect lets customers remotely monitor all key performance indicators including utilisation, fuel and Adblue consumption, fleet health, and driver behavior. With this, fleet managers can optimise driver performance, increase fuel efficiency, and reduce downtime. BharatBenz trucks are preferred in this segment due to fully loaded features, comfortable cabin, gear shift advisory, reverse camera display, best-in-class suspension, two-Stafe differential lock, static steering, and Driver state monitoring system that aims to avoid dangerous situations of drivers falling asleep or otherwise being distracted at the wheel. We will continue to introduce customer-centric technology features to elevate the experience of our customers. What are the major challenges for tipper trucks and dump trucks in the current scenario? We strongly believe the challenges we are seeing lately are short to medium-term challenges and India offers a huge potential for growth as economic revival happens and the CV market matures in its dynamics, efficiency, and business models. BharatBenz is strongly positioned in the construction and mining segment due to the robustness of our products where our products continue to lead the market offering the best turnaround time and on-time delivery. How do you look at the impacts of emission norms in the truck market? The government is increasingly focusing on higher standards of emissions, fuel efficiency, and sustainability through initiatives like the transition to BSVI, the recently announced scrappage policy, and the PLI scheme. We believe that the effectiveness of the recently announced initiatives will largely depend on the joint effort by the government and industry. For instance, the government’s push for a circular economy via the scrappage policy will aid the recovery of the commercial vehicle industry by boosting fresh demand. Incentives for scrapping old vehicles, along with swift actions to create necessary infrastructure are key to getting higher-polluting vehicles off Indian roads. To understand the impact of these initiatives better, I will cite the example of the BSVI regulation that was announced last year. DICV was well-prepared and ready for the BSVI transition, as we unveiled the BSVI trucks and buses range in January last year. The transition has been smooth for us, as we sold all of our BSIV trucks before the April deadline. The market has absorbed the price well and many customers understood it. It’s no secret that the new portfolio has helped us capture a much larger share of the market. What are the opportunities emerging in construction and mining for tipper trucks and dump trucks? There is a huge opportunity for the tipper and dump trucks to pick up pace in specific geographies where the Government is rolling out infrastructure projects. The finance minister announced that FY22 capital expenditure will be up by +34.5 per cent (Vs FY21 BE) at Rs 5.54 lakh crore. Rs 44,000 crore under capital expenditure is planned to be given to the Department of Economic Affairs in FY22. Over and above this, Rs 2 lakh crore will be provided to states and autonomous bodies to nudge their expenditure.