Daimler, Indian Firm Choose Site for Truck Plant

Daimler AG and the Hero Group have chosen a site in India to build a new truck plant, Bloomberg reported Monday.

The plant, to be located in Chennai, India, will be part of a Daimler-Hero joint venture and will begin producing up to 70,000 trucks a year by 2010, Daimler said.

The plant will initially begin building light and medium-duty vehicles, Bloomberg said.

Sweden-based Volvo AB, Germany’s MAN AG and U.S.-based Navistar International Corp. all have partnerships in India, Bloomberg reported.

The Indian truck market is growing at about 7% a year, Bloomberg said.

Daimler and Hero, a New Delhi, India-based company, agreed in April to invest about $1.1 billion in the project over the next five years. Daimler owns 60% of the venture.

Daimler is the parent company of Daimler Trucks North America, which makes Freightliner, Sterling and Western Star brand Class 8 trucks in the United States.