As relations between India and China seem to be mending on the business front, local auto major Mahindra & Mahindra has said Indian carmakers are open to competing with Chinese brands, provided they “compete on equal terms” and adhere to localisation norms of the country.
Mahindra has been betting heavily on electrics, which saw the company drive in a 7-seater version of its XEV9E SUV. The new three-row model, called XEV9S, has an entry price of ₹20 lakh for the 59 kWh (kilowatt-hour) battery pack and ₹22 lakh for the 79 kWh version (both ex-showroom). “As an Indian company, we welcome anyone to come and compete. But come and compete on equal terms. There should be a level-playing field and localisation norms should be adhered to,” M&M’s Executive Director (Auto and Farm Sectors) Rajesh Jejurikar said.
Chinese EV giant BYD has been operating in India for years, but has so far failed to get approval for its investment proposal for setting up a factory in the country. Another Chinese maker, Great Wall Motors, had to quit its plans to enter India — despite advanced discussions for setting up a factory — with the rejection coming at the height of India-China tensions over the border issue.
Many industry analysts believe that local players, as well as other non-Chinese multinationals, enjoy an advantage in India due to the govt’s decision to keep any serious Chinese competition out of the car industry.
However, increasingly the govt is recognising the dependency on Chinese supply chain (rare earth magnets, batteries, motors) in the automotive space, and is softening stance against supplier ecosystem, even though the stance remains tough against full-product makers.
For Mahindra and other EV makers like Tata Motors, Hyundai and now Maruti Suzuki, the absence of the highly-aggressive Chinese makers — who have destabilised the global auto industry due to highly-affordable pricing — is gradually turning into a huge advantage, even though most of them heavily source their components from the neighbouring country.
Mahindra is going aggressive in its EV plans, and is ramping up its production capacity from the current 4,000-4,500 units monthly to over 7,000 units by March 2026. Jejurikar said that the company has been building up a customer base on a healthy scale across key markets, and is now in the process of making the charging network dense by involving ecosystem players. “The current share of EVs in our total PV sales is around 9 per cent. We expect this to go up to 20-25 per cent by 2027-28.”
The company currently retails the EVs from its ICE (internal combustion engine) outlets, though it is also piloting EV-only dealerships at certain select locations. “We believe that EVs are still at an evolution stage where customers will want to evaluate both ICE and electrics. So, we broadly retail them from the same location for now.”
However, Jejurikar added that the company has “no intention” of reducing the focus in the ICE business. “We will not reduce the play in the ICE business. We want the customers to make a choice. We will not throttle from our side by pushing just EVs or ICE.”
