In an exclusive interview with Rajesh Rajgor, Anshul Gupta, Director, Commercial Business, Allison Transmission India, shares his company’s roadmap for the off-highway segment, specialty applications and electric vehicles
Following a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic, Allison Transmission returned to EXCON, South Asia’s largest construction equipment show. The company representatives were pleased to meet with visitors, existing and potential customers in person and showcase Allison transmission’s purpose-built for off-highway applications. In addition, Allison personnel discussed the company’s recent acquisition of India-based AVTEC Ltd.’s off-highway transmission portfolio and off-highway component machining business.
“The acquisition of the off-highway transmission IP rights from AVTEC will enable Allison to offer our product portfolio that is purpose-built to deliver improved performance and better productivity to customers in India and additional global markets,” said Anshul Gupta, Director, Commercial Business, Allison Transmission India. “Our commitment to the Indian market is strong. Our broad sourcing and operational plans for India are bolstered by this acquisition.”
At the tradeshow, Allison Transmission showcased products for vehicles ranging from a standard to a rigid dump truck with a capacity of up to 100 tonnes. Allison has been selected as a transmission supplier for heavy vehicle manufacturer-Bharat Earth Movers Limited’s (BEML) 60-tonne equipment. The Allison 6000 SeriesTM transmission, which is specifically designed for the 60-tonne rigid dump truck, will be integrated into BEML’s vehicle. Additionally, the Allison 4000 SeriesTM transmission will be incorporated into wide-body mining dump trucks used to remove overburden during coal mining. Allison believes that this segment has a large growth potential.
Strong Indian Commitment
Outside of the United States, Allison Transmission operates production facilities located in Hungary and India. Allison continues to demonstrate its commitment to the Indian market. “We set up the facility in Chennai, India, in 2010, and since then we have been focused on educating customers on the benefits of fully automatic transmissions compared to manual gear boxes and automated manual transmissions. We made end-users aware of the low total cost of ownership (TCO) and the value offered by Allison fully automatic transmissions over the entire lifecycle of the equipment or vehicle,” said Gupta. “As a result, our growth has been consistent. Allison has achieved tremendous success in the Indian bus industry, especially in the transit bus segment.”
In addition, Allison is in the early stages of growth in the truck segment. “India is still a market with very low power-to-weight ratio trucks. This factor, coupled with low acquisition costs, makes it difficult to understand the value of fully automatic transmissions. As the market adopts increased power- to-weight ratio and the duty-cycles become more demanding, we expect automaticity adoption to improve,” Gupta said. “However, niche applications, such as Fire and Refuse, are seeing increased adoption of Allison transmissions because of the impressive value offered by our products in this segment. Another area where Allison sees tremendous growth potential is in defense markets. The need for heavy logistics and specialty armored vehicles will continue to grow in the current climate.”
The Allison Philosophy
Allison is committed to working with both OEM partners and end-users to customize our propulsion solutions to meet the needs of unique vehicles and the individual applications they operate in. In addition, the company’s transmissions are fuel-agnostic, meaning they can be paired with alternative fuels including natural gas. Allison offers electric hybrid systems for transit and coach buses and recently launched its eGen Power ® portfolio of fully electric axles.
“Currently in India, we are in the process of conducting market research on MDT/HDT electric vehicles and if we come across an application where we can provide value to our customers, we will undoubtedly respond appropriately,” Gupta said.