Mr Mats Nilsson with Mr Nor Rahmat - winner of the 2015 Fuelwatch Challenge Malaysia)
A roller coaster ride. That's what the past month or so has been to Yours Truly. Trips, launches, visits, business meetings, family, hobbies, other pursuits have made it a very interesting period. I now have to put myself back in time to the Volvo Trucks Asia Pacific Fuelwatch Challenge 2015 finals in Hua Hin, Thailand to give you a short report on the session we Malaysian automotive journalists/reporters/bloggers had with Mr Mats Nilsson, Managing Director of Volvo Trucks Malaysia.
I'm the chap in blue...trying to look serious and professional during the interview session.
Mr Nilsson, Mats who I shall now address him in this article, is a nice chap who is deeply passionate about Volvo Trucks and Malaysia as well. He has been with the Volvo group since 1995 and for the last three years or so, he has been steering Volvo Trucks Malaysia to greater heights. He and the Volvo Trucks team have so far done a fabulous job here in Malaysia with increased sales to show for it. in 2014, Sales figures stood at a total of 451 units, comprising 422 Volvo and 29 Renault trucks (which are basically Volvo Trucks underneath and a separate business entity from Renault cars - much like Volvo cars and trucks). This was a 38.5% growth in Volvo Trucks sales in Malaysia.
Anyway, our meet and chat session with Mats was about the Fuelwatch Challenge and more. We did not touch too much about the Malaysian economy that is currently seeing a slump these days as it is assumed that austerity measures will and have been taken. Most of us at the point of time were hyped about the Fuelwatch Challenge itself.
The Fuelwatch Challenge is something big for Volvo Trucks Malaysia. According to Mats, at least 1,000 Malaysian drivers took part and this was a 25% increase in participation compared to last year. This has been the sixth year of competition and the competition as well as the increase participation is, according to him proof of the importance of good drivers by fleet or company owners. We see as an example this year's champion, Mr Nor Rahmat Abdul Talib's company Prifaria Sdn Bhd is one of those companies that put heavy emphasis on driver education and training. He also added that in the Malaysian leg, participants also came from companies that uses other brands of trucks and this is a form of marketing for Volvo Trucks. Drivers as well as company managers and operators would benefit from this increase awareness in training, safety and skill derived from this competition. Driver's skills and with the addition of a fleet monitoring system like Volvo's Dynafleet would enable savings in fuel consumption, tyre wear and vehicle maintenance too.
So that is the benefit that drivers and operators. The 2015 APAC Fuelwatch Challenge finals saw stiff competition from the Australian and New Zealand participants. This is mainly because of the familiarity with the Volvo FH series of trucks which were used for the competition this year. Volvo Malaysia has an intention to bring in the FH series trucks to complement the FM series which is the one sold here. No word as to when the FH series trucks are to be actually launched yet by the way.
We then asked that since there were women participants from four countries at this year's challenge so would there be a chance of a Malaysian lady participating in upcoming Fuelwatch Challenges? According to Mats, women drivers in Malaysia would definitely be welcome to participate. It has been shown that women can handle these trucks elsewhere so why should it be different.
As for buses, we asked why isn't there a category for Volvo Buses in the Fuelwatch Challenge? "The bus market is quite small for Volvo at this moment, about 9,000 buses annually worldwide" said Mats, "But we will definitely see". This was the response after we mentioned that even though the market is small but the engagement between driver and the general public is a lot more than a truck driver on the highways. There could be a need to assist in educating bus driver too (especially in Malaysia).
The other interesting question put forward was with the upsurge in motor vehicles going hybrid, would there be a chance of Volvo Trucks selling their diesel hybrid trucks here in Malaysia? Mats said that at this moment there are no plans for now even though there are products available (Volvo FE hybrids - check them out if you're interested). This I believe has to do with pricing, the size of truck (the heavy duty category of hybrid trucks aren't on sale everywhere yet from what I researched in order to write this article) and whether there would be local acceptance. Pricing would be an issue because the costs of hybrids may be more than what the market wants for a truck.
What Volvo Trucks Malaysia is ready for is, if or when the B10 grade of biodiesel is implemented here in Malaysia. Biodiesel is a diesel fuel produced from plant oils or animal fats. It is commonly sold blended with diesel derived from petroleum. Common blends include "B2" (2% biodiesel), "B5" (5% biodiesel), "B10" (10% biodiesel) and "B100" (100% biodiesel). Here, our B10 would mean 10% palm oil content owing to our large palm oil market of course. We had been hearing press releases from car manufacturers that some of their diesels cannot handle B10 grade and that it would cost damage to the engines. According to Mats, Volvo Trucks sold are able to handle such a grade of diesel. "Volvo is ready" said Mats, with confidence.
There would be no major impact to Volvo Trucks if and when B10 is implemented. There may be a change in the service schedule for older trucks and an installation of aftermarket kits to enable the older trucks to perform as they should. In fact, Mats then stated that Felda, which operates 90% Volvo Trucks in its large fleet has tested the B10 grade on their trucks with favourable results.
So there you go. The interview with the Managing Director of Volvo Trucks Malaysia who also said that he loves it here in Malaysia (must be the food and the people...as the weather kinda sucks with the haze these days). I do hope this would let you folks understand a little bit more about Volvo Trucks in slightly more detail.
