India: Sales of Electric Cars - March 2023

By Kamlesh Mallick & Karthikeyan Palanisamy
​Tata Motors continues to have no competition with electric cars at the start of 2023. For Tata Motors, 16% of their passenger car sales is already fully electric! 

• The Indian electric car market noted a 129% year-over-year increase in March, mostly due to the electric car offerings by Tata Motors. 
• Roughly 8,524 new electric cars were registered in India last month as per data available from the Vahan portal and press statements from Tata Motors.
• Electric cars accounted for about 2.1% of the total car sales in India so far this calendar year. Totally about 619,037 cars ware sold in India out of which 9,507 units ware Electric.
• The EV passenger car segment is still in its nascent stage. It's market share, which in March reached reached just about 2.6%
  • ​The percentage has increased compared to March 2022 which was 1.35%, this is due to the deliveries of Tata Tiago.ev
• Market experts say point out that 5% is the inflection point for any new technology (in this case EV's) to gain attention of the mass market and vertical take-off point in the ‘S’ curve starts. At 2.6%, the Indian Electric passenger cars have some ways to go.
  • With OEMs like Tata motors and MG ramping supply & introducing more new models like the Tiago.ev and new OEMs like Mahindra and BYD entering the market, we believe the market could hit the infection point of 5% as soon as the second half of 2023.
• Tata Motors is the undisputed leader of electric cars in India. They sold 7,078 units in March. 
  • ​This is a dramatic increase from the 5,318 units sold in February. This is the result of the commencement of deliveries of the Tiago.ev 
• The second best performing OEM in October was MG Motors who sold 496 cars in October.
• For Tata Motors, 16% of their passenger car sales is already fully electric! 
• For MG Motors, 11% of their passenger car sales is already fully electric. 
• Analysts are predicting 30% electric car penetration by 2030, but MG Motors is at 11% and Tata Motors is at 16% already.
• Noteworthy is the entry of the Chinese electric car behemoth, BYD - 281 units were registered last month.
• Lack of electric car options in the market is a big issue for the Indian consumer. Only Tata Motors offers more than one electric car model in its portfolio. Most car OEM's are delaying the EV movement by not offering even a single EV option.

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Electric Car Sales In India – March 2023

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Top Results last month:

1. TATA MOTORS PASSENGER VEHICLES LTD - 7,078
2. MG MOTOR INDIA PVT LTD - 496
3. BYD INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED - 281
4. MAHINDRA & MAHINDRA - 237
5. BMW INDIA - 51
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Top Results this calendar year:

1. TATA MOTORS PASSENGER VEHICLES LTD - 16,264
2. MG MOTOR INDIA PVT LTD - 1,289
3. BYD INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED - 654
4. MAHINDRA & MAHINDRA - 244​
   
5. BMW INDIA - 232

Wall of Shame
Here are some major OEM's who sell petrol cars in India. We are in 2023, and these OEM's have zero electric cars in their portfolio or they only sell limited models not doing enough to push EV's.

• MARUTI SUZUKI INDIA LTD
  • Don't expect any electric car from Maruti anytime soon. They will religiously do whatever Suzuki tells them to do. We can expect rapid decline in Maruti Suzuki's market share, due to this regressive mentality.
• HYUNDAI MOTOR INDIA LTD
  • Hyundai is a big name in India. They have the second largest market share of passenger cars. This year, they sold limited numbers of the Kona in India. It just is not good enough. They have announced electric car specific investments for India, but all of that may materialize only in the second half of this decade. Again, not good enough.
• TOYOTA KIRLOSKAR MOTOR PVT LTD
  • Don't expect any electric car from Toyota as well. This Japanese car manufacturer have been in denial when it comes to electric cars. Toyota's management seem to have a sunk cost bias due to their investments in hybrids and hydrogen. Toyota has been lobbying governments to water-down emissions standards or oppose fossil-fuel vehicle phaseouts. If Toyota HQ have buried their heads in the sand, don't expect much from Toyota India.​​ 

Thanks to Mr Karthikeyan from Zeon Charging for helping us with the research
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