Scania begins trial bus production in Bangalore, official plant opening in January

Swedish commercial vehicle giant Scania has commenced trail production of buses at its manufacturing facility near Bangalore. The company is gearing to roll out the buses from January 2015, when the bus plant will witness official inauguration.

In an exclusive interview to Autocar Professional, Anders Grundströmer, managing director of Scania Commercial Vehicles India and senior vice-president of the Scania Group, said: “Currently the company has commenced bus production on a trial basis in the Bangalore plant. Full-fledged building of complete buses with bodywork will start from January next year.”

Earlier in October 2014, when it inaugurated its integrated manufacturing facility for both truck and bus production in Narasapura industrial estate near Bangalore, the company had said it would commence bus production by the middle of this year.

Although the truck production began in October 2014 itself, bus assembly operations have not taken off as planned. 

When asked about this, Grundströmer said it was due to a delay in constructing the building infrastructure for a separate unit for bus production and also some delays from the vendors’ side too. However, the bus production will start from December this year or January next year, he added. 

He also said the company will not compromise on quality standards. At the same time, it is working to have higher local content in locally manufactured products. The buses will have around 80 percent of local content as the body, which is a major part of the vehicle, will be manufactured by Scania itself.

As of now the company has assembled three buses on a trial basis and the workers recruited in the bus production facility have been given training to take up full-fledged production activities from coming months, he added.

Currently the company has been importing its Metrolink coach buses from its overseas manufacturing facility and distributing it to its customers in India. The Scania Metrolink buses have seen good demand in the Indian luxury coach sector as a majority of South India-based fleet operators have purchased these buses in the past eight months. So far the company sold 40 such buses in India while the company has orders in hand to supply another 200 buses.

Some leading buyers include Karnataka-based SRS, National Travels, Tamil Nadu-based KPN and Parveen Travels, Kerala’s Thirumal Alaghu Travels and Aeon Connect Travels. Scania has also delivered two buses for trial runs to the state-owned Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC). At present, the Metrolink coach buses are plying between major South Indian cities like Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kochi, Coimbatore in addition to Pune and Mumbai on the western part of the country.

Scania’s integrated manufacturing facility in Narasapura industrial estate, which opened in October 2014, comprises an existing unit for truck production and the yet-to-be opened unit for bus assembly. In addition, the premises also house its state-of-the art service station to support aftersales operations while another building houses Scania’s Indian corporate activities. The central parts warehouse also has been accommodated in the same premises.

So far the company has invested Rs 300 crore at its Narasapura integrated facility. The existing truck plant has an annual production capacity for 2,500 units while the new bus plant will have a capacity to manufacture 1,000 buses per year.

According to Grundstromer, the company has plans to invest another Rs 150 crore to double its truck capacity to 5,000 units and bus capacity to 2,000 units by 2017 as the demand for its products have been increasing in the Indian market. The company will also start exports to neighbouring countries from December next year.

Currently the company has around 400 employees and will expand its workforce to 800 in the near future.

Photograph: Scania’s integrated manufacturing facility in Narasapura industrial estate near Bangalore