Mahindra wants to challenge Maruti & Hyundai with electric hatchback & sedan

Mahindra may have negligible presence in the sedan and hatchback space currently but all this will change with increased electrification of cars in India. The automaker – a leader in electric vehicle technology in India – has plans to make it big in the electric hatchback and sedan segments. Maruti and Hyundai are also working on electric cars, and are aiming to bring them to the market from 2020. Maruti is planning to launch the WagonR electric as its first car while Hyundai will launch the Kona Electric SUV.

Meanwhile, there are two options that Mahindra is currently considering:

1. Borrow the Figo and Figo Aspire platforms from Ford and electrify it.

2. Use Pininfarina’s design expertise to plan a new hatchback, compact sedan and a mid-sized sedan – all with electric power. Exact details on this move will be revealed soon.

For now, here’s what Dr. Pawan Goenka, the managing director of Mahindra & Mahindra said,

For shared mobility providers Ola and Uber, a small hatchback makes good economic sense; it will have more pull in the segment.

What this statement indicates is that Mahindra will not just target private car buyers with its new electric hatchback, it will also target cab aggregators such as Ola and Uber. In the next few years, cars operated by cab aggregators are expected to be more than those bought by private buyers. Also, subscribing to cars through services, such as Zoomcar’s ZAP is likely to become very popular, and Mahindra is likely to target such services as their main client base for the new range of electric cars.

More details about whether Mahindra will tie up with Ford to electrify the Figo and Figo Aspire will be revealed soon. The company has entered into a joint venture with Ford already, and only the finer details of this arrangement will be revealed. Meanwhile, Mahindra’s existing range of SUVs will get electric variants soon. The KUV100 is one of the first of Mahindra’s existing SUVs to get electric power. The soon-to-be-launched S201 (Ssangyong Tivoli-based) SUV will also feature electric power. The other electric SUV is expected to be the Aero crossover coupe, which was shown as a concept at the 2016 Indian Auto Expo. Maruti and Hyundai are also expected to cater to similar segments.

Via ETAuto