‘Leyland to focus capex on alternative fuel tech’

livemint.com:

Ashok Leyland, a Hinduja Group flagship company, will channel its capital expenditure towards developing various alternative fuel technologies for commercial vehicles over the next 18 months, even as it works on lowering development costs with partners, executive chairman Dheeraj Hinduja said. The company, known for its trucks and buses, has earmarked a capex of ₹600-700 crore for this financial year, and a significant part of it will be directed towards creating products with alternative fuel systems, such as hydrogen fuel cell buses, hydrogen-powered internal combustion engine (ICE) trucks, electric intermediate-trucks, as well as vehicles running on compressed natural gas (CNG) and liquefied natural gas (LNG). Leyland’s net-zero emissions subsidiary Switch Mobility has rolled out a range of electric light commercial vehicles (the IeV range) for last-mile transportation.

Separately, Leyland is also investing in developing a sub two-tonne commercial vehicle category. “Our capex requirement for this year is in the range of ₹600-700 crore, and a lot of it is going to this alternative fuel development. Our major capex programme happened a few years ago when we developed Avatar Modular range, and Bada Dost.

Now, we are looking at the sub-two-tonne truck but in this financial year and the next 18 months or so, the focus is on alternative fuel types. We have jointly developed a product with NTPC—a hydrogen fuel cell bus. We have developed a hydrogen ICE truck with Reliance Industries," Hinduja said.