Daimler India Commercial Vehicle (DICV), the Indian arm of Germany’s Daimler AG, posted an impressive sales growth of its BharatBenz trucks during the June quarter, but its market share declined during the period.

Riding on the positive growth of medium and heavy commercial vehicle (M&HCV) industry, DICV posted 63 per cent increase in its truck sales at 5,796 units during April-June 2018 period when compared with 3,554 units in the same quarter in 2017.

The company’s market share (in heavy duty and upper medium-duty truck market) during this June quarter dropped to 6.6 per cent from 8.7 per cent in March quarter of this calendar year and in the year-ago quarter. With a shift in customer preferences, heavy truck segment is witnessing an intensified competition.

For the January-June 2018 period, DICV’s total truck sales stood at 11,987 units when compared with 7,290 units, posting a whopping increase of 64 per cent. The market share during the first half was 7.3 per cent, down from 8.1 per cent in the first half of 2017.

“In India, the strong recovery continued in the medium and heavy duty segment. This partially reflects the release of demand in the market that had been pent up due to regulatory burdens in the previous year,” according to a document of Daimler AG.

DICV’s bus sales have also gathered a momentum in India and the company has doubled the bus sales at 500 units in June quarter when compared with the year-ago period. The company expects a significant revival of demand for buses in the coming months.

In 2017, the company sold 16,717 units of BharatBenz trucks in India, up 28 per cent when compared with 13,081 units in 2016.

According to a top official of leading private lender of CV industry, BharatBenz trucks have seen a strong acceptance in the Indian market and DICV is the only player that doesn’t play the discount game in the market. “It has strong potential to emerge as a key player in the M&HCV segment,” he said.

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