The “Gujarat State Road Transport Corporation” (GSRTC) placed an order with VE Commercial Vehicles Limited for 1019 units of Eicher 20.15 BS III Bus Chassis. VE is a joint venture of the Volvo Group and Eicher Motors. Eicher buses are already running in Gujarat and provide intercity and rural connectivity in the state. The new order placed by GSRTC shows its faith and confidence in the Eicher Brand.
Eicher has a large number of products ranging from 5t to 40t GVW trucks and 15 to 65 seater buses and this has helped the company to gain popularity as a complete CV manufacturer. Eicher unveiled its first truck in 1986 and since then, over a period of 26 years, have been serving large number of customers and has so far delivered more than 300,000 vehicles. The manufacturer’s “VE” series of Fuel Efficient heavy trucks and trucks in the 5 to 14 T segment have helped it gain a good market share. Eicher has a share of 38 per cent in 7-12T trucks category and 30 per cent in 5-12T trucks segment. The company's shares have helped it to register a strong presence in the L/MD segment. Eicher L/MD trucks provide quality performance with extremely good fuel efficiency. Eicher is also the first CV maker of the country to bring in a fuel efficient 14.5 T GVW truck.
Eicher provides wide range of products to its customers which include buses built by the company that come under the name Skyline & Starline. It also provides Bus Chassis using which customers can build buses as per their need. While the Skyline buses come with premium features for the passengers' comfort, Starline buses score on the economical front. Large number of educational institutions use Eicher buses, and this has helped the company gain a large market share among them. Eicher, in conjunction with the IRTE (Institute of Road Traffic Association), Parent Bodies and IIT-Delhi, in 1997, designed the first ‘safe’ school bus of the country. The design specifications laid down by Eicher School Bus became so successful that it became the norm for all the School Buses of the country to follow.
Eicher Buses & chassis are also making their presence felt in the Staff, Tourist and Public Transport deployment. The company's products have been specifically designed and optimised as per the needs in these segments. Eicher buses are popular in the market because of their overall low cost of ownership and the reason for the same is obvious from the ‘Eicher advantages’. Fuel efficiency of Eicher vehicles is their trademark feature.
Eicher, this year, has successfully made entry into State Transport Undertakings. The company received an order of 600 buses from Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation and successfully executed it by covering a majority of the vehicles under a contract of Annual Maintenance. Eicher also received orders for vehicles from Rajasthan State Transport Corporation and Uttarakhand State Road Transport Corporation. This shows the growing confidence of State Transport Undertakings on the Eicher brand. The company is gearing to establish a new manufacturing plant and the investment for the same has already been designed. Once the plant becomes fully operational, it will have the capacity to produce 10,000 buses and this will have the potential to set the company on a new voyage of growth.
On the receipt of the bulk order from the GSRTC, Mr. Vinod Aggarwal, CEO VE Commercial Vehicles remarked, “We are thankful to the State of Gujarat for reposing faith in our brand and look forward to this association. The vision of our JV is to drive modernization in the CV space in the emerging markets and this order is just the right step in that direction. Eicher branded buses are gradually increasing its presence in India as it seeks a larger footprint in the fast-growing emerging market and emerge as a full range bus player. The market share for Eicher branded buses increased from 7 to 10% in 2011”
