Mahindra Reva to launch 5 electric vehicles

Two months ahead of the much-awaited next-gen electric car, Mahindra Reva Electric Vehicles Pvt Ltd, a Mahindra Group company, is finalizing an aggressive product roadmap to expand its electric car business in India and overseas markets.

The company, which is likely to launch its new electric car, the four-seater Reva NXR during Diwali festival, has lined up five new models that includes three from Mahindra platforms and two from Reva for the launch till 2016. The new car is packed with a host of world first technology features.

The company is also finalizing a plan to develop infrastructure across the key markets for its electric car under a public-private partnership model.

“We are currently working on five models for launch in the next four years. Our aim is to launch one new vehicle or a new variant every year till 2016. We are right now doing the trial run of Mahindra Verito, Gio and Maxximo from the Mahindra platforms,” Chetan Maini, chief technology and strategy officer, Mahindra Reva told Business Standard.

He said the company has started trial production at its new manufacturing plant in Bangalore, which was inaugurated last month. The full production will commence in the next two weeks. After Mahindra Group acquired erstwhile Reva Electric Car Company, it has invested over Rs 100 crore to set up the new plant.

Maini said the new electric car, Reva NXR (it will renamed at the time of launch) will be priced at least 20 per cent higher than its existing car, REVAi, which is sold at Rs 4.87 lakh (ex-showroom, Bangalore). The new car will have lithium ion battery for the first time, which will run for about 100 kms for a full charge of six hours.

Meanwhile, the company is also finalizing a plan to develop infrastructure across the key markets for its electric car under a public private partnership model. “We are in talks with several state governments and public and private sector players like State Bank of India and Café Coffee Day among others to develop infrastructure like rapid charging systems for electric cars,” he said.

The company intends to first launch the car in Bangalore and Delhi and later expand to other key cities where the respective state governments are offering incentives for buyers, Maini said.

He said the company is waiting for the government of India to launch the new national policy on electric vehicles. Recently, the National Council on Electric Mobility (NCEM) has recommended to the government a Rs 23,000 crore programme to encourage and promote use of electric vehicles. The government is currently giving final touches to the national policy.

In the last 12 years since its launch, Reva has sold 4,600 electric cars in India and abroad. About 1,000 cars are sold in London, 300 in Norway and about 3,000 in India and half of them in Bangalore.

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