M&M’s head of auto division, Veejay Nakra, shares his company’s plans for the new Urban Prosper Platform and the vision for the pickup category in India
01 Oct 2024 | 442 Views | By Shahkar Abidi & Ketan Thakkar
In an interview with Autocar Professional, Veejay Nakra, President of the Automotive Division at Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd, revealed the evolution of the pickup truck segment in India and Mahindra's pivotal role in shaping it. He spoke on the sidelines of the launch of Mahindra's new platform UPP.
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In an interview with Autocar Professional, Veejay Nakra, President of the Automotive Division at Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd, revealed the evolution of the pickup truck segment in India and Mahindra's pivotal role in shaping it. He spoke on the sidelines of the launch of Mahindra's new platform UPP.
Products evolve over time. How has pickup truck as a category transitioned over the past few decades and what role did Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) play in it?
It actually goes back to the origin of the category, right from NC 670 D in 1978, and NC 640 DP in 1985. After that, we created the Maxx, which was in the late 90s, early 2000, followed by Bolero Pik-Up Maxx. That was a rural workhorse.
I think a lot of category firsts were created by us, Maxx being one of them. After we created the Bolero PikUp, we created a smaller version of it, which was the Maxxi truck – also called the Bolero Maxxi. It was more for city applications, lighter load, smaller nose, compared to the traditional large pickup. This is in the 2000s.
We also created Camper, because we saw that there was a potential of dual use of a large pickup, especially when you look at mining companies, construction companies…they need to move people and goods. And then, we created a Camper Gold, which was the one that came with air conditioning and power steering, power windows and those sort of personal mobility features. Along with this journey, we sort of kept on increasing our share and presence in the market. It would be safe to say that M&M created the pickup category in India and has always been a leader in it.
Can you please elaborate on your market share?
Even today in the 2-3.5 tonne segment, we enjoy a 63% market share. And in the less-than-3.5 tonne segment, which includes less than 2 tonne and 3.5 tonne, we've got a 51% market share. And in the last two years, we've only gained share. I think we've gained 8-9 percentage point market share in the less-than-3.5-tonne. In the overall category, we used to be 42-43% and now one in every two small commercial vehicles in the less than 3.5 tonne segment comes from Mahindra today.
If you further break down the pickup segment, there is the large pickup, and then there is a small pickup, and so on. So you've typically got the 1.2 tonne, 1.3 tonne, 1.4 tonne and then you have the 1.5 and 2 tonne. So if I put them in those two buckets, each of them is about a third of the market. And then you have the small – less than 2 tonne.
In the large pickup segment, which is the 1.5-2 tons, we've got 80% share.
In the small pickup category, which is the 1.2-1.5, where we fiercely compete with Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland, we have a 40% market share. This is where we come to the UPP.
We find that in this one-third of the market, we have only a 40% share, whereas in the other segments, we have an 80% share. So there's a huge upside for us in a very competitive space, and UPP will help us to gain that market share. Secondly, even if I look at that 40% share, in South India, we are at about 25%.
As a platform, we can do variations of almost 14-15 models on the UPP. It is like the power of choice that we will offer the customers. You can choose a standard deck, high deck, CBC, nine feet cargo box, ten feet cargo box, diesel. CNG. And also multiple load points.
We are not launching electric right now, but only diesel and CNG. We've done this ground up, and have designed it for CNG, diesel, EV. Most of the people are now trying to use their diesel platform to convert it into a CNG, or then convert that into a EV. We've been able to do all of this from the ground up.
The other big thing is that people who buy vehicles with high loading capacity have to compromise on safety and on maneuverability and the comfort of the cabin. So this has got fantastic maneuverability for the city. One of the segments in which we don't have a strong market presence is intracity application, where you need more maneuverability. Bolero Maxx Pik-Up has a long nose, so maneuverability is a challenge. This is a short nose, so it has got fantastic maneuverability. It's driver plus two seaters.
When you put the seats down, it can become a bed, which is again a segment first. Touchscreen or audio control buttons on the steering wheel, power windows, these are all category firsts.
These will be brought in under three variants - base variant, base plus, and base plus plus. We had a lot of insight from customers – they want safety, and so we have offered airbags, which is again an industry first. Besides that, today, there's a certain basic safety homologation requirement that you need to meet. But we are going way beyond that.
Today, if you get into an accident, the doors don't automatically open. This leaves the poor passenger locked in. There is no value for life. (In the UPP) if there is an impact, the doors will not get jammed. These are some very important things that people or most products don't offer in the category. We're bringing all of this into the segment to say that, listen, we value your life. It's not just about profitability and returns.
Similarly, there is no doubt about the mileage, and the service interval is going to be 20,000 Kilometers. Nobody gives that in this category, everybody's got 10,000 kilometers.
Currently, the industry is focused on giving a bare-bones product which only allows you to carry load or mileage.
It's a very price sensitive segment. You're trying to double the value right now. How have you taken into account the sensitivity around price?
We are extremely mindful of that. We've always been extremely mindful of the pricing of our products, and the same logic has gone over here. But there are certain variants and features which are not available in the market.
What's the vision of Mahindra for this platform and for pickups in general?
Our vision is very clear. We are market leaders. Market leaders are the ones who have to disrupt the category. UPP is a disruptor. It's a modular architecture. It will offer a lot of things on a single platform. We believe that this will really help us to further increase our market share. I’m not telling you how much our market share is going to be, but we are setting up a reasonable capacity. We are setting up a capacity of 120,000 for this product to begin with, and we can scale it up to 150,000 and this is incremental over and above my pickup capacity.