More than 95 percent of Energy In Motion’s electric heavy commercial vehicles are sold without batteries as majority of its customers opt to subscribe to a battery service plan that reduces upfront purchases by roughly 40 percent, Managing Director Narendra Murkumbi said on Wednesday, speaking of the inauguration of its new electric commercial vehicle assembly plant in Talegaon, Pune. He said the company was capitalising on pairing battery subscriptions along with dedicated charging and swapping infrastructure and significantly lower operating costs to make electric trucks a viable alternative to diesel vehicles.
Under the Maitryi Battery-as-a-Service programme, firms buy the truck chassis without the battery pack while EIM supplies the batteries and energy services through contracts normally spanning five to ten years. Being separate to the truck ownership itself has proved extremely popular with almost 95 percent of EIM’s truck sales being under the model. Almost 500 electric trucks are already operating under such subscription arrangements, he said, indicating that the approach is proving commercially viable. An EIM electric truck without its battery costs roughly ₹25 lakh, a figure higher than a comparable diesel vehicle. The company calculates that the higher initial outlay can be recouped in about 2.3 years through reduced running costs given a fleet is likely to be utilised for about 100,000 km annually. EIM estimates operating expenses of roughly ₹25 per km for its electric truck, including battery subscription and energy services as compared to ₹36 for each km for a diesel equivalent. That would generate potential annual savings of roughly ₹11 lakh for operators under the arrangement.
The new manufacturing complex in Ambi, Talegaon has been a major step in this expansion of this ecosystem with a ₹500 crore investment as the first tranche of a larger₹1,000 crore commitment in Maharashtra, with the Industry 4.0 facility bringing together electric heavy commercial vehicle assembly, lithium-ion battery pack production and an independent battery testing laboratory and has an initial capacity of 5,000 vehicles per shift per year while creating more than 2,000 direct and indirect jobs. The plant was inaugurated by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and senior political leaders, with significant support for the electric freight switch in the state.
Alongside vehicle production, EIM is rapidly expanding its energy infrastructure with the company planning to put up 160 megawatt-scale battery-swapping and charging stations across major freight corridors by the end of the decade. These are designed to complete a battery swap in under seven minutes, significantly faster than conventional charging, and will also support CCS-2 fast charging, with EIM already operating several such swap stations on major routes such as the Delhi-Mumbai corridor and around major ports, and hoping to reach 40 such facilities by March 2027.By integrating vehicle manufacturing with battery ownership, swapping infrastructure and renewable energy solutions, EIM is creating an ecosystem geared to making electric heavy commercial vehicles a viable option, with Murkumbi saying that the reduced cost barriers of subscriptions, predictable energy costs and reduced downtime was crucial to shifting long-haul freight traffic away from diesel in India. As the Talegaon plant begins to ramp up and a swap network is expanded, EIM is expecting the battery-as-a-service model to remain the dominant option for fleet operators looking to switch to electric trucks.