US President Donald Trump has been playing hide-and-seek by threatening the entire world with tariffs. In the auto sector, India is fairly insulated from the 25% reciprocal tariffs and speaking to PTI Ather Energy Co-founder and CEO, Tarun Mehta reiterated this and further said that this will not impact the EV adoption in India.
Indian auto sector not affected by US tariffs
Mehta, in his usual candid style, explained that the EV adoption story in India remains unchallenged as the US tariffs will have a limited impact on the domestic market. The CEO of Ather Energy said that the Indian EV market is largely driven by factors such as the total cost of ownership of an electric vehicle; especially an electric scooter, which is substantially lower compared to a petrol scooter, driving style and the ease of driving of an electric vehicle among others.
Express Drives previously reported that Trump’s tariffs are unlikely to significantly affect automobile OEMs, as India serves as a manufacturing hub with high component localisation and minimal exports to the US market.
Imports have been coming down: Ather Energy
India’s trump card is that most of the components are made by the domestic players and as for the EV industry, it does not export a lot to the US. According to Mehta, “The reliance on imports has consistently been coming down and the EV sector is not exporting a lot to the US and similar markets, rather the focus will be on other markets”.
It is well known that the battery in an EV equates to almost 30% to 40% of the total price. Lithium-ion cell is imported, but recently many new companies are investing in the production of these cells in India, which in the long term, Mehta believes will eventually shift to India.
What next for Ather Energy?
Ather Energy has tasted massive success with its mass-market scooter, the Rizta, which was launched last year. Mehta said, “Rizta has opened up a lot of new markets for us in India, especially in the markets where performance scooters Ather 450 don’t even sell. Hence these geographies were closed to us but have now opened up because of Rizta. So that gives us a lot of comfort and confidence.”
Ather Energy recently announced that it will venture into the electric motorcycles segment based on the Zenith platform. The company will roll out many electric motorcycles based on this platform starting from the 125 cc to the 300 cc segment. He also spoke about the new EL platform for scooter products.” EL is focused on scooters and it’s meant to enable more cost-efficient architectures while Zenith is focused on motorcycles aimed at products in the 125 – 300 cc category,” he said.
