Tata, the market leader for light, medium and heavy trucks in Nepal, has been facing stiff competition from brands like Eicher and Daimler as they have launched a range of tippers and trucks in the domestic market in the past month.

Daimler India Commercial Vehicles, a wholly owned subsidiary of Daimler AG, Germany, has recently forayed into the Nepal market with the launch of its BharatBenz trucks. The company has also unveiled its first sales and service centre in Birgunj.

According to Daimler India, the launch of BharatBenz in Nepal is the first outside India.

It has rolled out seven models, the 914 R, 1214 R, 1217 C, 2523 R, 2523 C, 3123 R and 4023 T, ranging from medium-duty to heavy-duty trucks. Prices of these vehicles start at Rs 2.7 million. “As we see great potential for light and

heavy commercial vehicles with lots of construction projects in progress, we have partnered with Daimler to sell its products in Nepal,” said Uday Kabra, director of Omni Trading, who bagged the dealership. “We have targeted selling around 200 vehicles this year.”

The company plans to add five more dealers across the country including in the Kathmandu valley besides rolling out two new models of heavy duty trucks.

Sipradi Trading, the authorised distributor of Tata vehicles in Nepal, had unveiled the next generation Prima LX 2523 T, LX 3123 T and LX 4023 S trucks and the LX 2523 K tipper on December 24 last year.

Anup Dhakal, senior manager of the Commercial Vehicles Business Unit at Sipradi Trading, said that sales of Tata commercial vehicles would surpass last year’s figure. “We sold 4,550 commercial vehicles in the last fiscal year. But considering the demand we are seeing for the vehicle, we expect sales to reach around 6,000 units this year,” he said.

Market leader Tata has started feeling the pressure from VE Commercial, a joint venture of the Volvo Group, that rolled out the Eicher Pro 1000 and Eicher Pro 3000 series of light and heavy trucks in the domestic market two weeks after Tata’s launch.

Anand Batas, chairman of Eastern Motors, the authorised distributor of Eicher in Nepal, said, “After the launch of the new range of vehicles, we will be able to increase our market share to 18 percent from 13 percent.”