Tata Motors on Friday said it has started working on its gigafactory in Somerset in the UK, and the financial closure for the project is underway. At the post-earnings concall, Tata Motors Group Chief Financial Officer P B Balaji said the company has seen some impact of the Red Sea crisis but “it is manageable at this point of time”.
Earlier in the day, Tata Motors posted a 133.2 per cent growth in net profit at Rs 7,100 crore in the December quarter, while the consolidated revenue rose 25 per cent year-on-year at Rs 1,10,600 crore.
“The site has been procured and we have already started the land-levelling work in that space,” Balaji said.
Tata Motors had last year in July announced plans to set up a global battery cell gigafactory in the UK at an investment of over 4 billion pounds to help power the automotive sector’s transition to electric mobility.
“We are quite well advanced in terms of executing the plans on the ground there. Accordingly, financial closure for the project is also underway as we speak,” he said.
As far as the execution of the ground is concerned in the UK, “it is all systems green”, he added.
Balaji said there is some “degree of impact” of the Red Sea crisis, but, “I wouldn’t say there is no impact but having said that, we believe at this point in time, it is manageable and we are trying to ensure that we minimise any impact that may come.”
“Rerouting is adding about 10-odd days in the portfolio and for specific lanes, the thick products, we are finding ways to navigate it,” he said.
On Electric Vehicle (EV) sales, he said the volumes have been increasing sequentially.
According to him, there is no cannibalisation happening between the EV and CNG segments.
“We do see strong growths coming through in CNG and EV part of a portfolio and that is expected to continue. And these are all incremental volumes,” he said.
Balaji also said that the company is targeting 25-30 per cent of the sales from EVs in FY25 and FY26.
