Strategic Analysis of TRATON SE, 2025

With Investments in Connected, Electric as well as Strategic Partnerships, the Group to Touch Revenue of €40.15 Billion by 2025

TRATON SE, erstwhile Volkswagen Truck & Bus, is on the transformational road from being a commercial truck and bus manufacturer to a mobility services provider. With the group’s MAN brand operating on wafer-thin margins while Swedish heavy-truck and bus brand Scania enjoys double-digit profit and growth, the group has laid a target of 9% profit margin in the short term.

The study also examines the pillars of Scania's commercial success and benchmarks its performance against other truck OEM brands well. MAN's RIO platform is being shaped as the base for the group's digital services in the future. TRATON is also pursuing software and device commonality of RIO with Navistar Inc's OnCommand Connection Telematics service in North America.

In the era of connected, shared, autonomous and electric (CASE) commercial vehicles, the group is rationalizing its sparse capital to make products more profitability in the present while also preparing for the future when commercial vehicle offerings will look nothing like those that are in the market today. Ownership by Volkswagen group offers TRATON SE the advantage of leveraging synergies from passenger vehicle technologies as well. TRATON will benefit in its own autonomous driving technology program through Volkswagen’s myriad partnerships such as with Microsoft, Argo AI and Ford, Audi Autonomous driving unit, etc.

TRATON SE’s IPO in June 2019 was off to a disappointing start with the company managing to raise a mere € 1.55 Billion in the capital for its strategic initiatives but its growth outlook remains robust with the host of initiatives it is taking on profit generation, new business growth, and digital solutions. It has the potential to leverage Scania’s industry-leading profitability and modularization efficiency to MAN and VW Caminhoes as well as build on strategic partnerships with Sinotruck, Navistar, Solera, etc to emerge a truly global leader in commercial vehicle space. The study looks at the performance of TRATON brands in the last 4 years, examines the activities and investments the group is making around CASE and provides an estimate of the group’s revenue in 2025.

Key Issues Addressed

• What is TRATON SE? How does it fit into the Volkswagen Group?
• What are the key activities around CASE by TRATON?
• How much revenue and profit did each of the brands generate in 2018?
• What will be the revenue of TRATON SE in 2025?
• What makes Scania relatively so much more successful?