Making trucks safer and smarter is what Daimler Truck Innovation Center is focussing on but they are not stopping at that. They are keen to put India on the driver’s seat in this innovation journey while leveraging the use of AI in addressing core safety concerns.
This is particularly relevant, given that road accidents in India have been on the rise. What is even more alarming is the share of large trucks. Data from across a host of sources indicate that Trucks are the third-highest group of vehicles that are engaged in road accidents and one of the biggest reasons is driver fatigue. This is exactly the area that the company is focussing on.
The Daimler Truck Innovation Center India was established on December 1, 2021.
The big India bet
The Daimler Truck Innovation Center India, headquartered in Bengaluru and established on December 1, 2021, completed 3 years. The Center, the largest R&D hub for Daimler outside Germany, is central to Daimler Truck’s overall strategy to decarbonize and use software and electronics to make trucks smarter, more connected and safer. Speaking to Financial Express.com, Raghavendra Vaidya, MD & CEO, Daimler Truck Innovation Center India (DTICI) pointed out that “we (DTICI) are driving the engineering globally, sitting in India, and not just doing, but leading, I think that is, that is the crossover that’s happening now. Doing it has, has always been the strength of India.”
DTICI is looking at ways to enhance the telematics infrastructure inside the truck, that is collecting data from trucks and continuously streaming it to the cloud. The company is looking at using that data for developing several applications and use cases for its customers. “But I would say we are at the beginning of that journey in India, because we still are yet to fully understand how to drive business value through connected trucks. But I think if you look at automobiles, commercial vehicles have a very clear business case,” added Vaidya.
Raghavendra Vaidya, MD & CEO, Daimler Truck Innovation Center India (DTICI) is keen to drive the innovation journey with India taking lead.
DTICI driving engineering globally from India
Outlining the growth path going forward, Vaidya highlighted how “effectiveness more than efficiency” is what they are focussing on. They believe the two primary pillars of their growth strategy in India, power to drive and intelligence to drive, is dependent on “how effective we are in gaining the knowledge and how effective we are in the ability to design the next generation products. Most of the challenges are in the engineering area,” explained Vaidya.
According to him, the three broad areas which are in focus and are attracting innovation and investments include, “software and electronics. We are continuously working on increasing the safety and intelligence of the truck. The second big area is data and AI, how to use advanced analytics, machine learning and AI to make businesses better. And the third area is to really take connectivity to the next level, where we want to develop advanced applications leveraging the real time data that is coming in.”
