Tesla’s India entry? Mahindra is unfazed: Here’s why

Tesla has been making waves in the Indian automobile sector, having finalized locations for its new showrooms. The Elon Musk-led company is going full throttle, even exploring land options for a manufacturing plant. With all these developments unfolding, could domestic carmakers be losing sleep? Mahindra & Mahindra has brushed aside the competition, highlighting its advantage in manufacturing localisation components, which allows for more aggressive and affordable pricing.

Mahindra is confident of denting the competition

Mahindra has made it clear that it’s not losing any sleep over Tesla’s planned entry into the Indian market. When asked at the NDTV Profit Conclave if Tesla would disrupt the EV market and pressure domestic automakers, Managing Director and CEO Anish Shah confidently stated that they are unfazed by Elon Musk’s company and remain fully confident in their products.

Furthermore, Shah emphasized that over the last couple of years, the domestic manufacturers have grown from strength to strength and can take on international brands. With India being a manufacturing hub for the auto sector, global companies cannot compete with domestic firms in terms of scale and at a lower cost as electric vehicles are completely made in India. 

Tesla has shown its seriousness in entering the domestic market by posting 13 job openings for India on its official LinkedIn page. 

Mahindra twin attack: BE 6 and XEV 9e

Mahindra recently launched two born electric vehicles — the BE 6 and XEV 9e, which are now open for booking. The two EVs racked up 31,179 bookings on day 1. What is interesting to note is that 56 per cent of the total bookings are for the flagship XEV 9e. Mahindra revealed that 73 per cent of the XEV 9e bookings are for the top variant, the Pack 3, which is powered by a 79 kWh battery pack.