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Ashok Leyland

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Ashok Leyland

Ashok Leyland Limited is an Indian multinational automotive manufacturer, with its headquarters in Chennai. It is now owned by the Hinduja Group. It was founded in 1948 as Ashok Motors, which became Ashok Leyland in the year 1955 after collaboration with British Leyland. Ashok Leyland is the second largest manufacturer of commercial vehicles in India (with a market share of 32.1% in 2016), the third largest manufacturer of buses in the world, and the tenth largest manufacturer of lorries.

With the corporate office located in Chennai, its manufacturing facilities are in Ennore, Bhandara, Vijayawada two in Hosur, Alwar and Pantnagar. Ashok Leyland also has overseas manufacturing units with a bus manufacturing facility in Ras Al Khaimah (UAE), one at Leeds, United Kingdom and a joint venture with the Alteams Group for the manufacture of high-press die-casting extruded Aluminium components for the automotive and telecommunication sectors. Operating nine plants, Ashok Leyland also makes spare parts and engines for industrial and marine applications.

Ashok Leyland has a product range from 1T GVW (Overall Vehicle Weight) to 55T GTW (Overall Trailer Weight) in trucks, 9 to 80-seater buses, vehicles for defence and special applications, and diesel engines for industrial, genset and marine applications. In 2019, Ashok Leyland claimed to be in the top 10 global commercial vehicle makers. It sold approximately 140,000 vehicles (M&HCV and LCV) in 2016. The company has passenger transportation options ranging from 10 seaters to 74 seaters (M&HCV = LCV). In the trucks segment, Ashok Leyland primarily concentrates on the 16 to 25-tonne range and has a presence in the 7.5 to 49 tonne range.

Ashok Motors was founded in 1948 by Raghunandan Saran, an Indian independence campaigner from Punjab. By the end of the Indian Independence Movement, he was persuaded by India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to invest in a modern industrial venture. Ashok Motors was incorporated in 1948 as a company to assemble and manufacture Austin cars from England, and the company was named after the founder's only son, Ashok Saran. The company had its headquarters in Chennai, with the manufacturing plant also in Chennai. The company was engaged in the assembly and distribution of Austin A40 passenger cars in India.[citation needed]

In year 1954 Indian government gave approvals to Ashok Motors to manufacturer Leyland Comet trucks the generation range of cabover trucks from Leyland and they also received approvals to manufacture Tiger Cub lightweight bus also by Leyland. These were the first ever models of British Leyland manufactured in india.

The collaboration ended in 1975 but the holding of British Leyland, which was then a major British vehicle conglomerate due to several mergers, agreed to assist in technology, which continued until the 1980s. After 1975, changes in management structures saw the company launch various vehicles in the Indian market, with many of these models continuing to this day with various upgrades.

In 1987, the overseas holding by Land Rover Leyland International Holdings Limited (LRLIH) was taken over by a joint venture between the Hinduja Group, the Non-Resident Indian transnational group and Iveco, part of the Fiat Group.

In 2007, the Hinduja Group bought out Iveco's indirect stake in Ashok Leyland. The promoter shareholding now stands at 51%. Today the company is the flagship of the Hinduja Group, a British-based and Indian originated trans-national conglomerate.

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