CNG Truck sales share in September dipped to 10% from 40% last year

New Delhi: CNG Prices have been on the rise for a while now and are seen to be impacting the Auto sales in this segment. Similar is the story of Commercial vehicles. Vinod Agrawal, MD & CEO of Eicher Motors VECV tells ET now that CNG Truck sales share in September dipped to 10% from 40% last year.

Commenting on the recent September sales for the company he says that the demand is holding strong and going forward expects the festive cheer to continue in this quarter as well. The growth in the second half will not be as great in comparison to the first half because of the base effect but overall, the second half looks strong.

CNG truck demand has taken a major hit continuously for on since September now. Penetration of CNG trucks has come down significantly he adds. The reason is simple where the price differential between CNG and ICE Trucks has narrowed in a major way and even the outlook on CNG trucks is also not great where the expectation is of even higher CNG prices. He says that the industry is discussing with the government if something can be done to help push the demand for CNGs because of their environmental nature.

Recently the product launches have been on the upside in the commercial vehicle segment as well and Vinod Agarwal adds that Eicher Motors too have very strong product launch plans. For now, they see No threat to market share with aggressive product launches by competition.

He adds that the company is Growing market share continuously which now has reached 9 percent this year for Eicher and Volvo combined in heavy-duty trucks.

In the Electric Bus segment, the company is already executing 2 orders, one in Chandigarh and the other on in Surat. The company has also shown interest in the recent CESL tender of around 6k buses. He says that the company is not looking for any funding when it comes to raising funds for the electric bus segment.

Currently, the demand is being pushed by multiple sectors like logistics, infrastructure and mining. The company this time around is hopeful of good demand coming from the FMCG segment. E-commerce is pushing the demand a big way as well.

After 2 slowdowns, this time the company is expecting a good pickup this year. Vinod Agarwal adds that we are still away from the earlier peak of 2018-19 and even this year the chances of reaching that peak sales number look bleak.

Light and Medium Commercial Vehicle sales can touch a new peak, but Heavy Commercial Vehicle and bus segment sales will be than the earlier peak this year.

He adds that major Export markets for the Indian Commercial Vehicle Companies which was South Asia got impacted due to new regulations in place thus hitting the revenue side from overseas markets.