Tata Motors began with Daimler lorries and now builds India's trucks and buses
Tata's vehicle business started in 1954 with a German partner, turning out Daimler lorry chassis in Jamshedpur. Seventy years on the group split in two: since October 2025 the Tata Motors name belongs to the trucks, vans and buses side, while cars and Jaguar Land Rover sit in a separate company.
The Mercedes-Benz tie-up produced its first goods chassis at Jamshedpur in November 1954, a 3-to-5-ton carrier with up to 100 horsepower. The partnership resurfaced after India opened its economy in 1991, when Mercedes and TELCO launched the W124 E-Class as the country's first taste of a luxury brand. It sold poorly because buyers knew a newer model already existed abroad, though the car later earned respect for being simple and dependable.
Much of the modern business came through expansion abroad in the 2000s. In 2004 Tata bought Daewoo's truck arm in South Korea, now the country's second-largest heavy vehicle maker, partly because India supplied about 94 per cent of its medium and heavy truck sales. A bus venture with Brazil's Marcopolo followed, split 51 to 49; Tata bought out its partner for 100 crore rupees in 2022. The Spanish coachbuilder Hispano Carrocera was acquired in stages from 2005, though its Zaragoza plant closed in 2013.
Two small workhorses defined its light-vehicle range. The Tata 407, launched in 1986, had sold over half a million units by 2012 and accounted for nearly three-quarters of light commercial sales. Then in May 2005 came the Ace, India's first home-grown minitruck under one ton, which analysts said created a whole new small commercial vehicle segment. Its load bodies came from Autoline, turning out 300 a day, and sales passed 500,000 by June 2010. The Prima heavy truck, launched in 2008, twice took commercial vehicle of the year.
The split announced in March 2024 moved the commercial arm into a new subsidiary incorporated that June, TML Commercial Vehicles. When the demerger took effect on 1 October 2025, it took over the Tata Motors name, with plants at Jamshedpur, Lucknow, Pantnagar and Dharwad, and a planned purchase of Iveco.
Source: Tata Motors
