Ashok Leyland's quest for digital solutions gets data monetisation boost

From real-time monitoring of over 220,000 vehicles on ground that helps customers in predicting problems along with quick support in case of breakdowns to AI-based customer solutions, Chennai-based Ashok Leyland is on the fast track to embrace new-age digital solutions. The company is now carving out a new and future revenue stream through data monetisation.

The commercial vehicle major's Chief Digital Officer Venkatesh Natrajan said the company is not just looking at indirect monetisation of data through platforms like Uptime Solution Center (real-time monitoring) that helps the servicing community, but also direct monetisation moves like charging customers for AI-based solutions like fuel fill and pilferage tracking and also providing data reserves to customers. This is in addition to the target of improving customer experience through digital initiatives.

According to estimates, the company has helped its customers save 15 per cent on costs – around 5-6 per cent on fuel and 15 per cent on fleet utilisation. The company is reportedly saving over Rs 25 lakh per month through the fuel solution for its customers. “It is still in an evolving stage and is very difficult to estimate how much revenue we are expecting through data monetisation,” Natrajan added.

Although the company started taking digital steps almost a decade ago, its ambition got a push some years back, when the company launched platforms like iAlert (a connected vehicles platform), Service Mandi, LeyKart (platform for selling spare parts) and e-Diagnostics. It was in 2020 that the company came out with the next generation solution - Digital Nxt – to help customers in tracing and tracking, fuel management, service due reminders and quick reactive support. Early this year, the next wave of ‘Digital Nxt’ solutions – including iALERT 3.0, Uptime Solution Center and AL Care were launched.

Natrajan said that around 70,000 BS VI vehicles and 150,000 BS IV vehicles are being constantly monitored by the Uptime Solution Center to help those consumers for predictive analysis. “Our focus is to constantly evolve on automation. We have now started data collaboration within the group companies also – like in Service Mandi users can avail vehicle loans from Hinduja Leyland Finance and home loans from Hinduja Home Finance,” he said.

i-Alert 3.0 is a telematics application to monitor vehicle information that looks into tracking and tracing of the vehicles, geo-fencing, trip management, route deviation tracking, fuel management, alerts, service reminders, driver monitoring and dealer locator. On the other hand, AL Cares provides an e-locker facility to store vehicle-related documents, in addition to providing service reminders, real-time alerts and dealer-service locator.

“Our goal is to improve the experience of employees and also customer experience. We are also trying to improve the driver efficiency through our solutions,” he added. Last week, the company’s Chief Financial Officer Gopal Mahadevan said that in order to boost the used-vehicle segment Ashok Leyland would be using its digital platforms in an aggressive way, instead of the traditional way of buying and selling used vehicles.