Clarity On Suzuki’s India Electric Vehicle Plan Soon, Says Bhargava
RC Bhargava on Suzuki-Toyota’s India electric car plan.
Maruti Suzuki India Ltd.’s chairman RC Bhargava said it’s not clear yet if its parent Suzuki Motor Corp. will use its plant in Gujarat to make electric vehicles in partnership with Toyota Motor Corp or would ship the vehicles from Japan.
More details were expected soon following a visit of senior officials from India’s largest carmaker to Japan, which concluded on Monday, he told BloombergQuint.
Suzuki and Toyota on Friday announced their plans to jointly develop electric vehicles, with an aim to launch in India by 2020. The companies, which signed the memorandum in February, said they agreed to let Suzuki Motor produce the vehicles for the Indian market, with the Toyota providing technical support.
“There’s not a lot of time left,” Bhargava said. The shift to electric vehicles has already begun with the government showing the way by placing an order for the first 500 electric sedans as part of a 10,000-vehicle order. India plans to turn all vehicle electric by 2030 to cut reliance on fossil fuels.
Maruti Suzuki’s role in the R&D of electric vehicles would be non-existent, Bhargava had earlier told BloombergQuint, citing efforts put in by its parent. Maruti Suzuki deploying resources into such research would merely be “duplication” of the efforts by Suzuki, he had said.
Suzuki earlier struck a joint venture with Japan-based Toshiba Corp. and Denso Corp. to manufacture lithium-ion batteries in Gujarat with an investment of about Rs 1,200 crore. The proximity of the battery unit to the car facility in Gujarat would make it viable for production of electric vehicles within India itself.
Suzuki and Toyota, in their statement, said their collaboration would extend to areas of establishing charging stations, human resource management for after-sales service, and for treatment of end-of-life batteries.