Green shoots visible in EV demand

Greenfuel Energy Solutions is specialising in energy solutions for sustainable mobility in the domestic market. The company’s Founder and Managing Director Akshay Kashyap intends for GreenFuel to become a leading player in the electric two- and three-wheeler space in the country. Excerpts from his interview with EPR:

Recent performance of EV sector in India
Overall the performance of electric vehicle (EV) sector in India is still very slow. The main market segments happen to be the low speed 2-wheelers and E-rickshaws still which are extremely low end and less engineered products. The total sales of high speed electric 2-wheelers from April to September stands at only 10,000 units however there are green shoots visible in the month of September. This tells as that consumer acceptance for EVs is still very low and the market is largely driven by very low end products. Cars make up a very miniscule market share of less than 1 percent. The EV story therefore will be largely driven by the 2-wheeler and 3-wheeler segment. I feel the traditional OEMs in India really need to step up and start offering a larger variety of EVs in all segments and spread more awareness. This has been lacking in India and is one of the reasons EV sales have still not broken through here.

Future of Indian EV sector in 2021
EVs in India will have a strong role to play in daily transportation needs. However, if we look at 2021 the sector will primarily be dominated by stronger loader vehicles for e-commerce deliveries where it makes strong economic sense to run an electric 3-wheeler. Public transportation too will see a higher adoption of EVs.

Recent breakthrough policy decision that will drive EV industry growth
I wouldn’t call it a breakthrough but the decision to allow sale of vehicle and battery separately could be interesting in the Indian scenario where battery swapping as a business could have a positive impact on adoption of EVs.

Probable growth of Greenfuel’s business beyond 2020
Greenfuel has always created products for the premium segment where reliability, safety and performance are given more importance than price only. For us, the better engineered and more complex the vehicle, the more relevant our solution becomes. Therefore, as we see the advent of vehicles with larger KW motors we are a perfect fit there and that will drive our growth. Further, we have a plan to offer better product solutions for the low-end market also but with better value proposition than existing ones. We hope that these two strategies will drive our growth.

How Greenfuel is turning the tide in its favour despite challenges
We get very positive feedback from the customer regarding the use of our Li-ion batteries. In fact, end-customers sometimes ask for only our product even at a slight premium. For us this voice of customer is very important. It tells us the market, even though dominated by cheap Chinese products and low-end Indian battery assemblers, will change as the consumer demands better performance and reliability. So we see this as a great opportunity to better educate the customers on Li-ion batteries and we see that they will inevitably choose a better product.

Traditional OEMs in India really need to step up and start offering a larger variety of EVs in all segments and spread more awareness.
Akshay Kashyap, Founder & Managing Director, Greenfuel Energy Solutions