Regardless of how electric vehicles will help change the world for the better, the steady rise in electric vehicle fires has left people confused. However, answering a question recently on how the fire incidents of electric two-wheelers from various manufacturers like Ola Electric, Okinawa, PureEV and even in the only case of Ather, will affect the growth of EVs in India, Ather Energy CEO and Co-Founder Tarun Mehta emphasized how these developments will help the EV industry mature.
“What has happened recently, I think the industry has matured. This will motivate more and more manufacturers to focus more on quality and reliability,” Mehta told PTI. Events are prompting more and more players to focus on “quality as the number one parameter”, he said, adding that in any case, “EVs are going mainstream, but with better quality products, there is a need for better quality products.” Also, it will be a no brainer.”
The Hero MotoCorp-backed firm expects sales of 30 million electric two-wheelers in India by the end of this decade and Ather Energy will invest “very heavily” for capacity addition over the next few years.
In April this year, cases of fire in electric two-wheelers of manufacturers such as Ola Electric, Okinawa Autotech and PureEV were reported. This prompted the government to set up a panel to investigate.
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Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari has warned companies of penalties for negligence and said they will be ordered to recall defective vehicles.
Following this, Ola Electric recalled 1,441 units of its electric two-wheelers. Okinawa also announced a recall of 3,215 units of its Praise Pro electric scooter to fix any battery-related issues. Similarly, Pure EV has recalled 2,000 units of its ETrance+ and EPluto 7G models.
On the fire incident in the Ather electric scooter, Mehta said that it was “an accident vehicle, where screws were changed, water was poured. It was not a real scenario.” “We have never set fire to a running vehicle. We are extremely proud of that record,” he said.
Ather Energy has focused on quality and reliability from day one, Mehta said, adding, “We have never been in a hurry for a launch. We have never tried to skip a test phase. We have been in the last seven- We’ve been building in eight years. And we’ve been extremely focused.”
On the potential of the electric two-wheeler market in India, Mehta said it is going to be huge, and “by the end of this decade, 20-30 million electric two-wheelers will be sold in the country.”
To meet demand, he said, “we will be investing a lot of money in capacity addition over the next few years. The first two plants are just a starting point.” However, he declined to comment on the company’s planned future investments.
In November last year, the company announced an investment of Rs 650 crore to set up its second manufacturing plant in Hosur, Tamil Nadu, to increase its total production capacity from 1.2 lakh units per annum to 4 lakh units.
(with inputs from PTI)