The Hindu Business Line : Tata-Marcopolo bus to roll out in a month

“The trial production has already started. Final tests are going on. In less than a month’s time the first product will roll out,” Mr Prakash M. Telang, Tata Motors Executive Director – Commercial Vehicles, told Business Line. The first set of products will be buses in the light commercial vehicle segment.

The Dharwad plant, set up with an investment of Rs 325 crore, has an annual capacity of 30,000 vehicles. The plant is expected to produce about 2,000 buses in the current financial year.

“The plant is much larger than what we had planned earlier. It would be one of the largest plants of its kind in the world. We did this expansion because we believe the market is going to grow in India. Not only in India and but also in the entire Third World,” said Mr Telang.

Tata Marcopolo Motors is a joint venture between Tata Motors and Marcopolo, the Brazil-based company that is into body-building for buses and coaches, with Tata Motors holding 51 per cent stake and Marcopolo the balance.

Export from Dharwad

The company is looking for export from Dharwad facility because of its proximity to the port. “We are looking for two sets of export models. One is fully-built buses with chassis from Tatas and bus body building from Marcopolo. And in certain countries like South Africa, Morocco and Egypt we do CKD (completely knocked down units) operations. We will send CKD kits from here,” said Mr Telang.

DTC orders

The Tata Motors - Marcopolo joint venture to manufacture and assemble fully-built buses and coaches has delivered 650 CNG-run buses to Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) from its Lucknow facility and has bagged an order for another 1,625 buses from the DTC. “We will deliver this order in 12-15 months time,” said Mr Ravi Pisharody, Vice-President, Commercial Vehicles, Tata Motors.

The company is providing low-floor low entry buses for city transport in Delhi and expects orders from other cities, including Mumbai and Bangalore. “The low-floor low entry buses have become almost the norm in the intra-city transport. India is just getting ready for that,” said Mr Pisharody.

body building

He said that Tata Motors put emphasis on bus body building. “The current practice in India is that market will buy chassis from big companies and do body building with third parties. Globally this is not very prevalent. All large companies supply high quality bodies. Basically, in our case, that is being done through Marcopolo,” said Mr Pisharody.

He said that the company-specified bus body building will improve the travel comfort and it is being well-received by the transporters. “Delhi Transport Corporation is the first to buy body-built buses and many more are coming up,” he said.

Tata Motors, the largest Indian bus makers and the second largest in the world after Mercedes-Benz, currently holds 50 per cent of the domestic market share.