A new report from Economic Times
says that Mahindra is developing 3-4 electric vehicles in the INR 8-10 lakh
price bracket. These new EVs may include an electric SUV with design inputs
from the Italian design firm Pininfarina in which the Indian automaker holds a
controlling stake.
The company is focusing heavily on vehicles that can
garner fleet sales from popular cab companies like Ola and Uber. The EVs need
to have affordable pricing, because unlike many countries going aggressive on
EVs with a subsidy of US$ 10,000, India has only about US$ 2,000 offered in
subsidy, he explained. Their sales must hit big numbers, perhaps in thousands,
to help notably in curbing pollution.
Besides EVs, Mahindra has four mainstream models in
the pipeline. The first is a new MPV, set to roll-out as the first vehicle
developed by the Mahindra North American Technical Centre (MNATC), codenamed
‘Mahindra U321‘. The second model is a new sub-compact SUV (codename: Mahindra
S201) which will ride on the SsangYong Tivoli’s X100 platform. A new mid-size
SUV based on the next-gen SsangYong Rexton (codename: SsangYong Y400) is also
planned.