IESW 2024: Tremendous investment opportunity in India’s EV value chain

The Day 2 of the inaugural session at India Energy Storage Week 2024 examined India's Roadmap for Vehicle Electrification, the impact of Central and State government policies on electrification of vehicles, ways to increase EV adoption and export opportunities, and key bottlenecks to address.

Dr. Rahul Walawalkar, President & MD, CES India & President, IESA, reflected on IESA's journey in helping build the electric mobility transition in India in the past few years. He highlighted the tremendous growth possibilities across electric vehicles (EVs), requisite EV charging infrastructure, and EV powertrain and component manufacturing and more.

Sunil Barthwal, Secretary, Ministry of Commerce & Industry – emphasized that India's EV journey has been notable in the past few years, wherein we are witnessing growth not only in EV sales but development of an entire ecosystem from the manufacturing of cells, battery packs, building out charging infrastructure, and more.

I feel this is one great opportunity that India is offering to investors from all over the world to invest in this whole value chain, he added. Mr. Barthwal called upon investors saying, "Now is the time for businesses to apply their mind, use the youth of India in R&D, in manufacturing, in creating jobs, in creating employment, and in creating a world which is net zero carbon emission."

HE May-Elin-Steiner, Ambassador of Norway to India noted that "There is no sector more important in the Australia-India bilateral relationship than the green energy supply sector. To find that no fewer than 41 Australian firms had decided to showcase here in this story. I believe that may be the largest foreign contingent that is at this conference and demonstrates our level of commitment. Ours is the country with the largest per capita rooftop solar in the world. So, we have much that we are able to share in our ability in that field."

Vikram Gulati, Country Head & Executive V.P. (Corporate Affairs & Governance) Toyota Kirloskar Motor highlighted Toyota Kirloskar Motor's efforts in driving e-mobility in India. He appreciated the Government of India for the commendable job they had done looking at supply-side , demand-side to the components level to be able to create an ecosystem in the country that enables us to shift to a sustainable future rapidly.

"By 2037, we are set to be a $35 trillion economy if we keep growing at 7%. Now, this may seem great but what it also means is that there will be a huge demand for transportation, mobility, road transportation etc… as we are very low in terms of vehicle penetration in the country. It's time for other stakeholders to also step up. It's also time for us from the industry to make that shift happen," he added.

Swadesh Srivastava, Head, Emerging Mobility Business Unit at Hero MotoCorp, highlighted a few measures necessary for accelerating EV adoption in India. He urged that OEMs to work on bringing down cost of technology to make EVs more affordable. He also suggested that OEMs, industry partners and government will have to create more awareness about the benefits of shifting to clean mobility in public consciousness. Further, making Norway a case in point he stressed on the need to build up EV charging infrastructure, so concerns related to charging anxiety to be addressed. And lastly, partnership for skill development and bringing more women in the e-mobility workforce.