Shriram Transport Finance plans launch of 60 auto malls

Shriram Transport Finance Company has rolled out the country's first automall last week. In an interview with CNBC-TV18, R Shridhar, MD, Shriram Transport Finance Company gave his perspective on the company's venture.

Below is a verbatim transcript. Also watch the accompanying video. Q: This is a totally different line of business you are one who has one to one association with their borrowers, the company was known for that, why do you get into a entirely different business of an auto mall? A: This is not a different business from what we are actually doing. This is a pioneering initiative for road transport industry where we have put about Rs 35,000 crore as of now with more than 1.2 million vehicles funded so far. So this is a facility which has not been available to the road transport industry so far. As a financer of commercial vehicles, we have a business model where we finance second hand vehicles. So today for example we are financing about 1,200 vehicles per day. Q: So the automall is the place where the people will buy and sell second hand vehicles? A: Yes, this is especially exclusively created for trading facility. This is not a place where we buy vehicle and sell. This is an infrastructure, which we have created for the buyers and seller of the second hand commercial vehicles to meet. Q: What will you make in terms of margins say at the end of the first year? A: We will always fix some commission for arranging this facility for the truckers. So that will be beside that in a due course because this is the first automall we have launched. We have a plan to launch about 60 auto malls, so this is a facility for not only our truck owners, small trucker, it will be for fleet owners and also for the corporate who reprocess vehicles, nobody has got any facility that is why we have created.