Abhinav Sinha of British International Investment (BII) envisions India surpassing China in EV adoption by 2030, ahead of Europe and the US, driven by government support and cost considerations, emphasizing the country’s potential for significant growth in electric transportation.
British International Investment, UK’s development finance institution, is betting big on the Indian electric vehicles ecosystem and expects to invest another USD 300 million in the next three years, according to its MD and Head of Technology & Telecoms, Abhinav Sinha. The company, which has backed Mahindra group’s electric vehicles (EV) arm besides other startups like Euler Motors, Turno and Battery Smart, has already invested around USD 300 million in the Indian EV sector and sees further investment opportunities in EV manufacturing, components and financing segments in the country.
“India has quite an evolved auto market… On the EV side, the penetration right now lags the rest of the world… The (overall) penetration of EVs in India is something like 6 per cent and we see it quite easily expand, double and more than double quite quickly,” Sinha told PTI in an interview.
He further said, “the leader today is China, but for India to be significantly ahead of where it is today… we think it’s a very achievable sort of an objective… So we’re quite bullish.”
Sinha was responding to a query on how British International Investment (BII) sees the EV ecosystem in India compared to the other markets in the world and investment opportunities in the country.
By 2030, he said there will be a “massive level” of EV penetration in public transportation in India and there will be “quite a bit of traction on the passenger (electric) cars, as more and more people adopt it”.
“I would imagine even if it’s not as much as China, it’ll be ahead of Europe and the US in the way it’s going and all the push coming from the government as well as the logic of total cost of ownership,” Sinha said.
On BII’s investments in India, he said, “We have invested (USD) 300 million so far in this whole EV space… we’ve backed Mahindra in India, on their EV platform and that’s a very significant investment for us, almost USD 250-million.”
Moreover, it has also made investments in Euler Motors, a startup commercial EV manufacturer, Turno, an EV distribution and financing for small businesses and individuals and Battery Smart, a battery[1]swapping network for electric two- and three-wheelers.
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