The electric two-wheeler market crossed the 600,000 sales target (of units) and achieved a market penetration of 4 per cent in Calendar 2022, reveals VAHAN data.
According to VAHAN, 624,192 two-wheeler units were registered in the country, up a staggering 300 per cent over 2021, when only 153,523 units were registered; electric vehicle (EV) penetration was just 1 per cent.
The sales target of half a million (or 500,000) was achieved on the back of high sales from Ola Electric, Okinawa Scooters, Hero Electric, and Ampere EV by Greaves, which sold more than 65,000 units apiece in CY22.
These players hold 60 per cent of the total E2W market in the country.
The total number of two-wheelers (internal combustion engine and electric) registered in CY22 stands at 15.4 million, up by 13 per cent against the same period last year. In the first nine months of 2022-23 (FY23), with average sales of 56,000 units per month, 506,000 E2Ws were sold.
Although the E2W players sold the highest-ever number of units in CY22, the industry is, however, facing challenges in meeting sales forecasts, observe industry players. Hero Electric, one of the three EV players to have touched the 100,000 sales target in CY22, believes the EV industry needs to be protected against headwinds that come from businesses that feel the heat of exponential EV growth.
Hero Electric Chief Executive Officer Sohinder Gill says that in CY22, the top E2W players were up against carefully curated bilious campaigns to sully their image. “These faceless Swiss-based mails slowly cast their net wide to 12 EV players, leaving only the legacy players untouched. These mischievous elements were able to pull down our volumes to half of what had been planned, but could not divest us of market leadership position,” says Gill.
According to the Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicles (SMEV), holding up over Rs 1,100 crore subsidy of a majority of players for months on end has squeezed the working capital requirements of major original equipment manufacturers, resulting in sluggish sales.
In a recent statement, SMEV said although the E2W industry performance in CY22 looks positive with sales of about 600,000 units, the volumes are not in step with the projections made by policy think tank NITI Aayog and other research agencies.
“There could be more than 20 per cent shortfall in the projections made by the Aayog of 1 million units for the full FY23,” SMEV said in the statement. According to SMEV, if the subsidy issue is not resolved quickly, it may adversely affect the 2023-24 volumes projected to be over 2 million units.
The government halted the subsidies of many companies in September after receiving complaints, mainly related to violation of the Phased Manufacturing Programme guidelines. These had been referred to the International Centre for Automotive Technology and the Automotive Research Association of India testing agencies for re-verification. According to VAHAN, the E2W industry witnessed a 19 per cent dip in sales in December, raising red flags for the industry. A total of 64,348 units were sold in December, compared with 76,598 units in November.
