Arya's EV Drive Hits Pay Dirt

Nishant Arya has led JBM Auto into electric vehicles, charging infrastructure, batteries, renewables and more.

- Arnika Thakur

IN 2023, JBM Auto participated in Busworld Europe in Brussels, the world’s largest bus and coach B2B exhibition, and launched two electric models—luxury coach ‘Galaxy’ and city bus ‘ECOLIFE’. The company says these models have lightweight stainless steel monocoque chassis and advanced technologies such as intelligent transport systems and telematics.

Over the last decade, the auto parts manufacturer has evolved to make buses and is creating an entire electric vehicle (EV) ecosystem. The idea to enter buses came from one of the first major decisions of Nishant Arya, vice chairman, JBM Group and managing director, JBM Auto—acquiring an Italian engineering design company specialising in sports cars, high-end materials and commercial vehicles. “India did not have a bus player. It had truck makers making buses as they wanted to use truck chassis for other applications,” he says. The company started making buses in 2013 with Italian technology partner BredaMenarinibus and launched its first ultra-low floor bus in 2014.

Since then, the 38-year old, who trained in Germany, France, Italy, Japan and U.K. at the beginning of his career, has led diversification into EVs, charging infrastructure, batteries, renewables and more. In FY24, revenue from OEM division, which manufactures electric buses, tripled to ₹1,741.21 crore (35% of total) compared to ₹549.74 crore in FY23 (about 13% of revenue).

Overall, JBM Auto has three main business divisions—auto components systems, which makes parts for commercial and passenger vehicles and farm equipment; OEM, which makes and runs electric buses; and tools, which makes tools, dies and moulds. The company has 16 subsidiaries, of which two are listed.