Daimler AG, established in 1873, is believed to be its

parent company The owner of this parent company Gottlieb Daimler merged it with Karl Benz to form Daimler-Benz Daimler-Benz produced its first petrol-powered car in January, 1886 Daimler formed a distinct new enterprise known as Mercedes in 1901 In 1926, he merged his Mercedes with the Daimler-Benz enterprise. Then onwards, the name Mercedes-Benz came into existence due to economic necessity during World War 1 Mercedes-Benz is now owned by Daimler AG and Daimler Chryler

Introduction

 Mercedes-Benz Accessories GmbH was founded in the year 2000. Its business include car accessories, personal accessories, collection and promotional items, and product design It has secured the 4th place in the quality leadership race of car companies Mercedes-Benz partly owns the formula one Team McLaren Mika Hkkinenin and Lewis Hamilton are two champion drivers for Team McLaren

Contd..

 Few thousand workmen, engineers etc work in the assembling plant in Chakan near Pune city. 240 employees work at the MBRDI Company policies Mercedes-Benz has enjoyed a remarkable reputation in the global market for more than eight decades Capital Intensive Company Hails from a country which promotes capitalism post World War II Mercedes-Benz boasts that their vintage vehicles were used by high rank Nazi officials and the Fhrer himself, Adolf Hitler.

Internal Environment 250 employees working in 13 sale outlets of Mercedes-Benz in India

 Mercedes-Benz is a quality-oriented company. They aim at groundbreaking technologies. The company has a Premium pricing policy. The target customer are the ones who are less price sensitive i.e. the conspicuous consumers. Cars available from Rs. 30 lacs to 3.5 crores in India and 8 crores abroad
Marketing Strategy

Mercedes-Benz does not believe in television media marketing. Print media is commonly used to advertise its products and ideas Hoardings and brochures are also used to publicize the brand

 Sales promotion in India is in the form of a lucky draw for those who avail a test drive The winner of such a lucky draw may win a chance to own a C-Class Mercedes-Benz for a year and runner-up wins a trip to Lavassa to watch the Merc Road Show To simplify the market supply medium, Mercedes have channelized their output from factories directly to dealership outlets. These outlets are franchised to outside parties.

Suppliers Bridgestone supplies tyres to Mercedes-Benz commercial and formula 1 cars Tesla motors provide car batteries Car interior accessories are provided to it by its own division, Mercedes-Benz Accessories GmbH Competition It faces cut-throat competition in from BMW, Volkswagen, Audi etc., BMW being the closest competitor in India To gain competitive advantage Mercedes-Benz constantly introduces new models, innovations, extensive marketing and searching new Indian markets

External Environment

 A distinct strategy adopted by Merc to evade competition is tie-ups. Mercedes-Benz have ventured with Aston Martin to concoct Lagonda, Renault to endeavor the upcoming Forfour and undoubtedly the most in vogue repercussion of such amalgamation is the SLR series which is a Mercedes-Benz tie-up with McLaren Mercedes-Benz has other attractive offers like discounted car loans and estimable finance schemes with Kotak Mahindra, HDFC and ICICI

Technological Environment
Mercedes-Benz makes a constant effort to improvise its technology. To achieve technological up gradation, it has set up a R&D centre in India whose basic function is to Indianize all Merc cars to make them suitable on India roads. Due to availability of ideal raw materials to produce a SUV, the SUV production has been transferred from Germany to USA.

The Blue Efficiency

Goal: To optimize each and every detail to make the model work more efficiently. When used in conjunction with efficient engines, BlueEFFICIENCY packages from Mercedes-Benz can help reduce fuel consumption, and therefore CO2 emission by upto 23%. Mercedes-Benz S400 is now available with a HYBRID engine. It has two combustion engines, one that combusts water and the other petrol. The electric motor optimizes a certain engine, in accordance with driving circumstance i.e. Water engine is used under 60 km/h and petrol above it due to the low power offered by Water combustion engine. This HYBRID will help save nearly 20% of fuel usage in urban traffics.

 Mercedes-Benz NGT is a bi-fuel car. It is up to the driver to decide whether he wants his car to run on CNG or petrol at a certain point of time as the car can operate on both premium-grade petrol as well as CNG. This will help lower emissions, lower fuel consumption cost and lower engine noise in traffic situations. Mercedes-Benz F-CELL is another blue efficiency revolution. The car runs without the use of fossil fuels. Electric energy is produced by the reaction that takes place between hydrogen and oxygen in the fuel cell. The most impressive result: the only thing that the reaction leaves behind is water.

Social & Natural Environment

With 'The Jatropha Biodiesel Project', Merc addresses the issues of rural income and employment, indigenous as well as environmentfriendly biodiesel and reclamation of wasteland Its automotive training programmes, like Mobile Kids are aimed at developing local technical competence in India. Mobile Kids is a programme running in various schools across India that takes internationally relevant traffic safety issues and brings them across through information, motivation and training

 In April 2002, the company introduced the first of its kind, a comprehensive one year 'Mechatronics Programme'. The program is aimed at developing local technical competence in India and the sub-continent for Mercedes-Benz cars Automotive diagnostic skills as well as electronic and electrical networking systems The concept is a joint initiative of Mercedes-Benz India and the Government Polytechnic in Pune and is supported by CIM (Germany) Mercedes-Benz India, in collaboration with the Government Polytechnic, Pune, has introduced a PostDiploma course on Advanced Automotive Technology.

 This One-year Post-Diploma course enables students to be trained as per the highest standards of modern automotive technology The curriculum also imbibes soft skills such as written and oral communication as well as behavioral skills. The curriculum incorporates key elements of automobile & electronics technology as well as insights about advanced automobile systems, diagnostics and hands-on training.