In an interview with CNBC-TV18, Veejay Ram Nakra, President of the Automotive Business at Mahindra & Mahindra, highlighted the significance of the new facility. “This is an all-new, world-class manufacturing facility designed exclusively for our electric SUVs. It includes dedicated assembly lines, an underbody line, and a comprehensive battery manufacturing and assembly setup,” Nakra explained.
According to Nakra, a key highlight of the Chakan facility is its advanced battery manufacturing capabilities. Contrary to simply assembling imported components, the plant undertakes the full manufacturing process. “From the cell to the module to the pack and finally to the entire battery that powers the vehicle—everything is manufactured, assembled, tested, and validated in-house,” Nakra elaborated.
The facility is geared to produce 90,000 electric vehicles annually, supporting the launch of Mahindra’s flagship EVs, the BE6 and the XEV 9E, which are priced at ₹26.9 lakh and ₹30.5 lakh, respectively, for the top-end pack three variants. These models are part of the company’s INGLO platform, which underpins a series of upcoming EVs.
Nakra confirmed that the first four vehicles based on the INGLO platform, including the BE6, XEV 9E, a 7-seater EV codenamed E8, and the Rall-E, will all be manufactured at the Chakan facility. “As we scale up and develop new products, brands, and platforms, we will evaluate our manufacturing footprint accordingly,” he added.
Below are the excerpts of the interview.
Q: What is the importance of M&M’s new production line in Chakan for the company’s EV push?
Nakra:
This is an all-new, state-of-the-art, world-class manufacturing facility that is built in our Chakan facility. The facilities created for the electric SUVs are dedicated facilities in terms of the assembly line, the underbody line and a full-fledged battery manufacturing and assembly facility. These are all new and state-of-the-art in terms of the kind of facilities, the technology and the automation that’s gone behind creating these electric SUVs.
Q: I would also like to ask you about your electric vehicle battery manufacturing plant. When you mention battery manufacturing, what exactly is going to be happening here? Is it the assembly of battery components with the core cell being imported from abroad?
Nakra: When we talk about battery manufacturing assembly, it is the battery manufacturing. That means that the cell is brought into this facility. Everything else to move from the cell to create the complete battery that goes into the vehicle—from cell to module to pack to the entire battery—the manufacturing of that, the assembly of that, the testing and validation of that—all of that happens in this facility that we’ve created for the battery manufacturing here at Chakan.
Q: Could you give us a sense that in terms of battery manufacturing and electric car manufacturing, what’s going to be the initial capacity here?
Nakra: I think we had already put that out earlier, where we had said that we’ve set up a facility for the two products that we have launched, the BE6 and XEV 9E. We’ve set up a capacity of 90,000 vehicles per annum.
Q: All future electric vehicles will be manufactured here at this Chakan facility only?
Nakra: The first four products that we are going to bring out to market on the INGLO platform, which is the BE6, the XEV 9E, we also spoke about the 7-seater EV, which has been codenamed E8, and the Rall-E, all of these on the INGLO platform will come out of the Chakan facility.
As we scale up and create newer products, brands, and platforms, in due course, we will see from a manufacturing footprint where we will produce those.
Watch the video for more
