In India, where an increasing number of consumers aspire to own bigger cars to cope with the country’s notoriously potholed roads and bad traffic, automakers are betting on low-cost battery-powered SUVs to capture the budding electric vehicle market.
At the nation’s major auto show in New Delhi earlier this month, there was a new breed of EVs taking center stage, with predominately foreign companies looking to muscle in on the nascent electric scene. In a marked shift in rhetoric, local auto bosses were also excitedly talking up the sector’s prospects.
Homegrown manufacturers Tata Motors Ltd. and Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. are now jostling with Chinese giants BYD Co. and SAIC Motor Corp.