By IANS
Chennai : In order to cash on the sub one tonne goods carrying vehicle sales, Piaggio Vehicles Private Ltd is targeting over four fold increase in sales of its four-wheel goods carrier Ape Truk, a top official company official said.
“Having sold 4,000 units last year, we are hoping to increase the sales to 18,000 units this calendar year,” J. Narayanan, general manager-customer care, told IANS here Wednesday.
Last year, the Rs.15-billion (nearly $400 million) Piaggio Vehicles launched its Ape Truk as an answer to Tata Ace and also established a separate dealership network to sell its four-wheel vehicles.
“We will increase the number of outlets where Ape Truk is available to 300 this year from the current 100 outlets.”
“Our strategy is always slow and steady growth,” he added.
Ape truk was launched at a price far lower than Tata Ace. In addition the vehicle can carry 865 kg as compared to Tata Ace’s 745 kg capacity.
That apart the company is targeting sales of 175,000 units of three-wheel vehicles (100,000 passenger carrying, 70,000 goods carrier and 5,000 CNG/LPG vehicles).
“Last year we sold a total of 1.59 lakh (159,000) units comprising of 85,000 passenger carriers, 65,000 goods vehicle, 4,000 Ape Truk and 5,000 CNG/LPG powered passenger and goods carriers,” Narayanan said.
The company logged a positive growth even as the industry as a whole logged a negative growth last year.
Narayan was speaking on the sidelines of an event to launch two variants of company’s three-wheel goods carriers – Ape Xtra and Ape Xtra-LD.
The two new versions are variants of its 560 kg load good carriers and the company hopes to sell around 30,000 units this year alone.
The standard version of Ape Xtra has an extra strong cold rolled loading platform with additional reinforcement to enhance the longevity of the load tray.
“The vehicle also has a new clutch and extra strong gear box to ensure extra performance and reliability,” Shyam Kumar R., deputy general manager-sales (Tamil Nadu and Kerala) added.
In addition to the above features, the other variant Ape Xtra LD has a longer deck making it the longest load body vehicle in its category.
The vehicle comes with an extended 20-month warranty without any restriction on the kilometres run. The company also launched Ape Xtra engine oil.