After clocking sales of 76,952 units in October, electric two-wheeler (E2W) volumes remained nearly flat in November with sales of 76,162 units, as per the VAHAN portal.
The sector’s underperformance has been led by Okinawa Autotech. The firm was reportedly under the government’s scanner for failing to comply with FAME-II regulations, which saw the government halting the subsidies to Okinawa. This compelled the company to hike prices of its scooters by 30-50 percent, thus hitting sales.
Okinawa Autotech MD and Founder did not respond to calls made by Moneycontrol in spite of multiple attempts to speak to him in this regard. An emailed query sent to him also remained unanswered until the time the story got published.
A spokesperson of the Society Of Manufacturers Of Electric Vehicles (SMEV) said, "The growth momentum in the electric two-wheeler industry has been building positively in the last few months. However, we may miss the target for this fiscal year."
In the current financial year, the E2W industry has clocked a volume of around 4.3 lakh units till November, and with four months left, total sales may fall 20 percent short of the 1 million units projected by both NITI Aayog and SMEV.
Ola Electric topped the charts the third month in a row by selling 16,246 e-scooters, a marginal increase over the 16,129 units sold in October. The company said it has shipped over 20,000 scooters for the second consecutive month and also claimed that E2Ws now hold 90 per cent market share in the premium scooter segment.
Bhavish Aggarwal, Founder and CEO, Ola said, “The complete dominance of EVs in the premium scooter segment shows that the only reason customers still consider an ICE vehicle today is due to the lack of world-class EV alternatives. We will continue to build and expand aggressively with products across multiple segments and price-points, and lead the transition of the Indian 2W industry to 100 percent EVs by 2025.”
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Greaves-owned Ampere Electric Vehicles held the second spot with its best monthly sales till date of 12,232 electric scooters in November. In the third position was Okinawa Autotech, which saw its sales drop 36 percent to 9,038 units in November compared to 14,121 units in October.
At fourth place with 9,008 units Hero Electric saw a slight uptick in sales in November. TVS broke into the list of the top five brands in November by dispatching 8,073 iQube electric scooters — its highest single-month figures till date.
Ather Energy, which slipped to 6th position, sold 7,741 units in November compared to 7,351 in October. However, its dispatches slipped to 7,234 units, a 12 percent drop from October (8,213 units). The company’s Chief Business Officer (CBO) Ravneet Singh Phokela claimed that November demonstrated seasonality in sales post the festive period.
“This is a seasonal trend and not a reflection of underlying demand. We have retained our market share, and expect the industry to bounce back in January 2023 and continue the growth momentum,” he said.
SMEV said that to re-establish the industry's growth trajectory, strategic impetus and minor course corrections are required so that mid-term and long-term targets are not missed.
“It is important to address issues such as kinks in the incentive scheme and the timely formulation of a mid-term and long-term policy post FAME 2, to support the ambitious plans of at least 25-30 percent market share of E2Ws FY25," the SMEV spokesperson said.
The Faster Adoption & Manufacture of EV (FAME) subsidy is to incentivize EV manufacture and adoption.
