New Mercedes-Benz Luxury Coach

Daimler India has unveiled a new Mercedes-Benz 2441 SHD luxury coach.

- Ashish Bhatia

The luxury coach market is India is estimated to be in the region of 600 to 1000 units. Leading the market is Volvo Buses. After trying its hand at penetrating the market, Scania is claimed to have shut down its plant on the outskirts of Bangalore and returned home. In such a scenario is it brave of Daimler India to unveil an upgraded Mercedes-Benz SHD coach, which it builds at its plant on the outskirts of Chennai. The original SHD coach appeared a decade ago with the body built by Sutlej. Scania was not there then, and the Mercedes-Benz coach went on to compete with the Volvo coach. The numbers then were even less than that of today. Volvo had a front runner advantage, but the star found a calling. It took off to a good start. As Daimler set up its own commercial vehicle business in India and set up a plant dedicated to the manufacture of trucks and buses on the outskirts of Chennai, the Mercedes-Benz Actros and coach chassis assembly operations shifted from the Mercedes-Benz plant at Pune to Chennai. By the time the operation shifted, Daimler was building the coach bodies in India. This was done in the interest of higher quality and customer satisfaction.