Swedish CV player Scania has announced the world premiere of its bus range Scania Fencer in Great Britain. The product is the result of 15 years of partnership with Chinese bus and coach builder, Higer.
Scania’s global success in the bus and coach business is based on the strong partnerships built with many bodybuilders worldwide. These collaborations are an integral part of Scania’s bus and coach strategy.
A new range
Scania Fencer is a completely new range of city buses and in the future will cover all versions: low-floor, low-entry, 2-axle, 3-axle, articulated buses and double-deckers. It’s developed, designed and constructed by Scania and built at Scania’s own bus lines at the Suzhou factory.
The first Scania Fencer launched is a city bus, and with this launch, the OEM gains a new platform for its bus business in the British Isles.
Anna Carmo E Silva, Head of Buses & Coaches at Scania, “With the new Scania Fencer range in our offer, we will strengthen our position in the market and keep driving the shift towards a sustainable transport system.”
Martin West, Sales Director, Buses and Coaches in Scania Great Britain, said, “For the Fencer development, we worked directly with the Higer team. We are so impressed with their passion for the product, the attention to details, and also their ability to produce specifications for the British operators.”
The genesis
In 2004 Scania established partnership with Higer, a bus body builder within the Chinese King Long Group. After launching the A80 luxury bus, aimed for export from China and used by the Chinese Olympic team during the summer games in Beijing 2008, the bus duo researched and developed the Scania Touring A90 High-class Deluxe coach, mounted on a chassis manufactured in Sweden and bodied by Higer.
In 2016, a new factory was completed in Suzhou, west of Shanghai - a dedicated production facility for Scania Higer products. With an area of 22,000 square metres, the factory has a production capacity of 1,000 units/year on a single shift basis. At the same time, a dual-brand strategy was launched in the partnership.
Both Scania and Higer expected China to be the main market for the cooperation, but it turned out that most of the common products would be sold outside China. To date, the Scania-Higer partnership is the largest exporter of high-end coaches from China, with more than 3,000 of the cost-efficient Scania Touring coaches delivered to more than 50 countries worldwide.