Layoffs, corporate restructuring, governance and most importantly profitability: The 14 Indian startups that plan IPOs this year are pulling out all the stops to ensure successful market debuts.
With a million-odd electric vehicles (EVs) - two-wheelers, e-rickshaws, buses and passenger cars - expected to hit the road this calendar year, the shift from gasoline-powered vehicles has become irreversible. Now the question is whether the supply chain is ready for this shift. Key components - the high-powered lithium-ion battery and the cells which go with it, the electric motor, and the electronics powered by chips - account for nearly 60 per cent of the cost of an EV.
The new four-wheeler (4W) electric vehicle (EV) policy may spur the entry of global majors. The manufacturing policy cuts Customs duty to 15 per cent, given a minimum investment commitment. It calls for a minimum investment of Rs 4,150 crore (about $500 million) for making electric four wheelers (e-4Ws), with manufacturing to commence within three years of approval.
Tamil Nadu -- often dubbed as India's own Detroit due to its thriving automobile manufacturing ecosystem -- is in no mood to miss the EV bus either. Recent developments attest to it. Vietnamese electric vehicle (EV) maker VinFast has promised a $2 billion plant in the southern state. And as promised earlier, the work on Tata Motors-JLR plant will kick off next week, on September 28, after the foundation stone laying ceremony.
'The government's priority is not farmers.'
Five cities -- Delhi, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Surat -- ceded their power of procurement and agreed to a different procurement model to operate state-run buses.
The car was expected to have a price tag of Rs 10 lakh and launch was slated for this June.
Vietnam-based electric vehicle maker VinFast, a rival of Tesla in the global market, has set foot in India and began work on building its Rs 16,000 crore EV manufacturing facility at Thoothukudi in Tamil Nadu. The company has already sought a reduction in import duties on its cars for about two years until customers get familiar with the brand and its unit in the state. The global major kicked off the construction of the first phase of its integrated EV hub, which may see Rs 4,000 crore of investment initially and will create more than 10,000 jobs.
The US carmaker's entry into India is expected by the last quarter of the current financial year.
TVS Motor Company has been one of the best-performing two-wheeler stocks in the current financial year (FY24), enriching investors with gains of 24 per cent. Among listed two-wheeler stocks, only Hero MotoCorp has done better in this period. New launches, market share gains, steady margins and expectations that its performance will continue in FY24 are expected to support TVS Motor's stock.
A 22-year-old youth and a person with disability died, while at least 11 were injured, in separate rain-related incidents in the national capital on Wednesday evening. The incidents occurred amid sudden changes in weather in Delhi, as a rainy storm marked by hail wrecked havoc across the city, throwing traffic out of gear as far as Delhi-Noida, Delhi-Ghaziabad, and Delhi-Gurugram roads and uprooting several trees.
'It is for the first time in Independent India that collection of information on caste is being done.'
Ahead of the upcoming Union Budget, Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicles (SMEV) has asked Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to either rejig the FAME II scheme or reintroduce FAME I, saying the programme meant to promote EVs in its second avatar has been able to achieve less than 10 per cent of its target. The Rs 10,000-crore FAME-II scheme which is to be implemented over a period of three years, came into effect from April 1, 2019. It is the expanded version of FAME India I (Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid) and Electric Vehicles (FAME) which was launched on April 1, 2015, with a total outlay of Rs 895 crore.
If the drop in sales over the past two years is anything to go by, India's dream of putting seven million electric vehicles on road by the end of this decade has come a cropper.
The only silver lining in March's performance -- which otherwise dragged down the financial year's momentum -- was a 6 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) growth compared to March of the previous year. This is largely due to incentives, festival-driven gains, and new launches.
'We handle close to 3 million rides daily, making us one of the largest players in this segment'
So far at least eight incidents of EV fires have been reported in just over a month's time.
The Ministry of Heavy Industries announced on Tuesday that it has received bids from seven players for the re-bidding tender of the 10 gigawatt-hour (Gwh) tranche of the Advanced Chemistry Cell (ACC) manufacturing production-linked incentive (PLI). "The list of bidders (in alphabetical order) who have submitted bids in response to this tender are ACME Cleantech Solutions, Amara Raja Advanced Cell Technologies, Anvi Power Industries, JSW Neo Energy, Reliance Industries, Lucas TVS, and Waaree Energies for a cumulative capacity of 70 Gwh," the ministry said in a statement. After the re-auctioning for the manufacturing unit was announced in January, the pre-bid meeting was held on February 12, the ministry said.
Almost all of these companies either unveiled their new electric vehicle or alternative energy-powered models.
'Currently, EVs are about 30-50 per cent more expensive than ICE vehicles. I believe the inflection point for EVs will come when this price gap narrows to 20-25 per cent. That's when people will start coming in.'
From the customer point of view too, LFP batteries are safer and offer a longer life.
Arun Jaitley presented the Budget in Parliament on Saturday.
The electric scooter juggernaut which has been picking up momentum with heady growth month-on-month is now slowing down. The combined number of registrations in April of eight electric two wheeler companies has seen a dip of over 1 per cent to 43,061 vehicles, according to data from the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways' site VAHAN. The reasons are the continuing shortage of chips, especially after the Ukraine-Russia war, and the spate of fires which have led to scooters being recalled by manufacturers.
After lagging behind other segments in the automotive (auto) space over the past few years, two-wheelers are expected to reverse their volume underperformance. After witnessing a 36.3 per cent volume decline over the 2018-19 (FY19) through 2021-22 (FY22) periods, the sector staged a recovery in 2022-23 (FY23), with volumes rising 17 per cent. While volumes are still a quarter lower than the FY19 peak of 21 million units, a double-digit growth trajectory is expected to prolong.
Ratings agency ICRA on Wednesday revised downwards growth forecast for the domestic passenger vehicles industry to 8-11 per cent in the ongoing fiscal from the earlier estimate of 14-17 per cent on account of the ongoing semiconductor shortage. Similarly, for the two-wheeler segment, it said the volumes are expected to contract by 1-4 per cent in FY2022 against an earlier prediction of 6-8 per cent growth as affordability and demand sentiments of target clientele was hit sharply by the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic. With around 5 lakh units of production lost by various automakers in the passenger vehicles segment due to the semiconductor shortage, ICRA said the earnings loss for the OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers) could be around Rs 1,800 crore to Rs 2,000 crore for the ongoing fiscal.
According to the official, an electric bus on Route 66 (from Ballard Pier in south Mumbai) was on its way to Rani Laxmibai Chowk in Sion when the incident occurred.
Vader is the first electric bike in India to offer 7-inch Android display.
Leading passenger vehicle maker Maruti Suzuki on Saturday reported marginal growth while Hyundai and Tata Motors posted a decline in their sales in February as a slowdown in the market continued with demand remaining muted. On the other hand, Mahindra & Mahindra and Toyota Kirloskar Motor posted double-digit growth riding on their SUV and MPV models.
It takes a while to get used to the constant and instant supply of power that is the case with EVs, and handling the S1 Pro when it takes a corner or makes a turn can be tricky, says Pavan Lall.
Scooters India Limited (SIL), a public sector automotive company, is mulling foray into the electric two-wheeler segment and is presently evaluating the expressions of interest (EoIs) by some domestic companies for a possible collaboration. The Lucknow-based company aims to augment its product range from passenger three-wheelers to include green two-wheelers.
If the drop in sales over the past two years is anything to go by, India's dream of putting seven million electric vehicles on road by the end of this decade has come a cropper.
A series of flip-flop on policies and a non-existent charging infrastructure are the biggest challenge in achieving the target of selling 6-7 million hybrid and electric vehicles by 2020.
'Every Indian should move to an EV, and the government should not buy any fossil fuel cars. The government should become the first driver of EV adoption.'
'We don't have to compete with Maharashtra or Gujarat. We have to now start thinking about how we compete with the United States or China.'
Ola Electric is moving the delivery for the first batch of its electric scooters to between December 15 to the end of the month, a two- to four-week delay from its earlier schedule, due to a shortage of chipsets and electronic parts. The first batch of deliveries were scheduled for November 30 but the company decided to delay them after a meeting between its factory team and the global supply chain on Saturday. It became clear that the late delivery of chips and electronic parts was only 'getting worse', sources told Business Standard. Ola has apologised to customers for the delay and said it is "ramping up production as fast as we can so that you can get your Ola S1 at the earliest". It has stopped taking any new bookings until the chip shortage has eased, say sources.
Overall, the BGauss RUV 350 is a feature-packed electric scooter with a unique design and competitive performance.
Bajaj Auto's market capitalisation (market cap) hit Rs 2 trillion mark for the first time. The stock of the two and three-wheeler major rallied 6 per cent to hit a new high of Rs 7,420 on the BSE in Tuesday's (January 9) intraday trade after its board approved Rs 4,000 crore share buyback at Rs 10,000 per share. The stock ended the day at Rs 7,093.75, up 1.55 per cent and its market cap a shade above Rs 2 trillion.
India's flagship motor show Auto Expo 2023 kicked off on Wednesday with the global unveiling of Suzuki Motor Corporation's concept electric SUV 'eVX' which is slated to hit the market by 2025. The company's Indian arm Maruti Suzuki India is among the major manufacturers participating in the show that has returned after three years. The Concept eVX is a mid-size electric SUV concept designed and developed by Suzuki Motor Corporation (SMC), Japan. It will be powered by a 60 kWh battery pack offering up to 550 km of driving range on single charge.
More than 40 new product launches are expected at the upcoming Auto Expo which will be held under the umbrella of Bharat Mobility Global Expo 2025 from January 17-22, a government official said on Tuesday. With visas continuing to be an issue, large scale participation of Chinese companies are unlikely although some of them are participating at the expo, Joint Secretary at Ministry of Commerce and Industry Vimal Anand said at the sidelines of curtain raiser of 'Bharat Battery Show' which will also be a part of the Bharat Mobility Global Expo 2025.
