Daimler delivers first bus chassis from India to Egypt

Daimler India Commercial Vehicle Pvt. Ltd. (DICV), a wholly owned subsidiary of Daimler AG, Germany, has started to export bus chassis from India. Hartmut Schick, Head of Daimler Buses, and Markus Villinger, Head of Daimler Buses India, were present at the Egyptian capital of Cairo to celebrate the delivery of the first bus chassis to the company’s long-time business partner MCV.

The products in question are nine-ton bus chassis that MCV will equip with bodies in Cairo. Starting immediately, the finished vehicles will be sold as Mercedes-Benz-brand buses through MCV’s nationwide sales network.

“The export of bus chassis from India to Egypt is yet another demonstration of how we are successfully leveraging on our global presence,” said Hartmut Schick at the festive handover of the chassis. “Our global production network allows us to offer appropriate and competitive products for every market.”

To this, Karim Ghabbour, Founder & Managing Director, MCV added: “We’re convinced that the chassis from India will ensure our buses’ high quality and at the same time expand our product range with a high-performance vehicle that will be offered at attractive terms.”

Competitive, high-quality products

The OF 9t bus chassis with front-mounted engines are manufactured at the Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV) plant in the southeastern Indian city of Chennai, and delivered from there to Egypt. The bus chassis are rolled out from the same assembly line as that of BharatBenz trucks, as they are technologically similar to the medium-duty BharatBenz trucks. As a result, Daimler was able to begin with exports before the bus plant was completed at the Oragadam site.

The chassis from India are especially modified for use in buses. The chassis are competitive, high-quality products, due to their high degree of localization and their incorporation in state-of-the-art production and logistics processes. This enables Daimler Buses to offer vehicles in previously unexploited segments of the Egyptian bus market. The company plans to include additional export markets in its sales network at a later date.

 Construction of bus plant progressing in Oragadam

Meanwhile, construction of the DICV bus plant is continuing at a rapid pace. Daimler is investing around €50 million in the project launched in March 2014. The company expects to begin producing Mercedes-Benz and BharatBenz buses at the plant at the end of the second quarter. Spread across an area of 113,000 square meters, the plant is being built within the existing premises of DICV. The plant will have an installed capacity of 1,500 vehicles per year in the initial phase, and can be expanded to 4,000 units subsequently. Once construction is completed, the facility in Oragadam will be the first Daimler plant worldwide to produce trucks, buses, and engines for a total of three brands.