INDIAN tractor manufacturer Mahindra & Mahindra has announced its entry into autonomous vehicle production.
It has signalled commercial production will start from early next year, in a phased roll-out.
Developed at the company’s Mahindra Research Valley in Chennai, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. managing director Dr Pawan Goenka said driverless tractor technology was set to take farm mechanisation to new heights
“It will make farming more productive and profitable, reduce health hazards for farmers and change the future of food production,” Dr Goenka said.
“This technology is designed to enable tractors to perform a variety of farming applications and operate varied implements.”
According to Rajesh Jejurikar, Mahindra’s president, Farm Equipment Sector, the need for farm mechanisation is higher than ever before, due to labour shortage and the need to improve productivity.
“Coupled with our ‘DiGiSENSE’ technology that we launched last year, the driverless tractor offers a distinct advantage to the Indian farmer by bringing an unprecedented level of intelligence to the tractor”.
This technology will be deployed across Mahindra tractor platforms in the future with a power range mooted between 15kW (20hp) and 75kW (100hp).
Features of Mahindra’s autonomous tractor will include auto steer, auto-headland turn, auto-implement lift and skip passing.
Safety features will include Geofence lock, to prevent the tractor from going outside the boundaries of the farm; remote stopping and remote engine start.
The Mahindra Group is a $US 19 billion federation of companies.
It has a leadership position in utility vehicles, information technology and financial services and is the world’s largest tractor company, by volume.
Headquartered in India, Mahindra employs more than 200,000 people throughout 100 countries.
Mahindra is certainly a company going places.