For Ashok Leyland – the 75-year-old legacy brand – the foundation of its success has been its focus on indigenised technology. Known as a reliable manufacturer, the brand has also earned customer trust by building products on home-grown capabilities.
Delivering his keynote address at the Hexagon Design & Engineering User Conference India 2025 in Chennai, Dr. Saravanan, Chief Technology Officer of Ashok Leyland, said the company takes immense pride in developing and adopting indigenised technology without foreign collaboration.
“The certainty of our journey defines the future of commercial mobility. The CV industry is the lifeline of the economy, and there is a commercial vehicle in every walk of life. Indian mobility is evolving towards a new inflection point,” he remarked.
According to Dr. Saravanan, the automotive sector is being shaped by seven key drivers – urbanisation, decarbonisation, sustainability, digitisation, safety norms, geopolitics, and changing customer needs. These, he said, will give rise to three major challenges: complexity, agility, and reliability.
“Today, we are balancing between conventional and alternate energy while embracing new simulations. The industry is facing challenges in connected and digital vehicles, ADAS, agility, and more – all of which are shifting the perspective from trucking to mobility. Customers today want trucks equipped with all features, seamlessly connected to networks,” he explained.
Highlighting the pace of change, Dr. Saravanan emphasised that manufacturers are moving rapidly towards digitisation, with design engineering playing a critical role. “The ultimate goal is to operate within a digital twin chain of value creation. Looking ahead, digitisation will lead the way,” he concluded.