Tesla Faces Timing Bug in India Entry

Is it too little, too late for Tesla in India? The Elon Musk-led electric vehicle (EV) giant's quiet entry into the country through two showrooms in Delhi and Mumbai in the past month—bereft of hype, and with no local senior leader—has been compounded by geopolitical friction between India and the US, and its non-committal approach to local manufacturing.

- Ayaan Kartik

Its rivals in the premium EV segment note that the Indian market has changed drastically since 2020 when Tesla was first slated to launch in India. "If this was five years back, I would have agreed that consumers will look to move towards Tesla, but I think electric cars themselves have moved far in the last five years," Santosh Iyer, managing director and chief executive officer of Mercedes-Benz India, said.

Iyer noted that there are several locally made options for EVs available from Indian and foreign original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), which was not the case five years ago, suggesting that automakers are much better prepared to face competition. "I think time will tell whether the timing was right or it was too late," Iyer said.

In these five years, Mercedes-Benz has launched six EVs such as EQA and EQS SUVs, and BMW has also brought in six SUV EVs such as the i7, i5 and iX, among others.

Other luxury brands that have launched EVs in India include Audi (e-tron) and BYD (Sealion 7, Atto 3 and Seal).