Mahesh Babu, Director & Chief Executive Officer of Switch Mobility India takes Utkarsh Agarwal, Editorial Lead of BW Autoworld on an electric bus ride, describing the future of electric buses and how it is transforming public transport. Excerpts:  

Q. In 2014, Switch Mobility entered the London (U.K.) market and in April 2021 in India, since then how has been the journey so far?   

Around 8-9 years back, Ashok Leyland acquired a company called Optare in the U.K. Since then, it’s now been a decade since we have been making electric buses. In 2019-2020, Ashok Leyland decided to bring in the electric vehicle (EV) assets of Optare in Ashok Leyland and form a global company called Switch Mobility. So, for the last 19 months, we have been operating globally. We already have around 115 buses on the roads in India and around 300 buses globally with more than 600 orders in hand and I’m sure it will cross 1000+ orders before the end of the year. That makes us a good front-end brand. 

In terms of footprint, Switch has a dedicated factory within the Ashok Leyland premises in India. Our manufacturing facility in Chennai will address the Indian supply chain. Globally, we have a factory in Leeds that will cater to the UK market and a factory in Spain will address the European market. 

We have around 770 people working in the company and around close to 300 people in research & development, as our focus is on bringing new platforms and expanding our footprint between the U.K., Europe and India. 

Q.  What was the thought behind spinning off a separate company and not make e-buses under Ashok Leyland’s name?  

The intention of most of us, including the group, is to have a dedicated team and focus on electric mobility. Electric mobility is scaling up, particularly in the bus and LCV segment and Switch will be in commercial vehicle space. We are witnessing a substantial amount of growth in electric buses and the deliveries are going to increase this year -- double compared to last year and triple by next year. So, spinning off a separate subsidy was to ensure a dedicated focus between the two. Our mission is to democratise zero carbon mobility across the globe with a focus on Europe, U.K., India and markets like India. 

Q. Will the new platforms that Switch Mobility is working on ‘Made in India’?  

Our buses will be manufactured in India, we have localisation content of around 60 per cent. The battery cell is still imported as it’s not Made in India, that’s about 35-40 per cent of the value. The rest is done by our local suppliers and us.  We make our own battery pack assembly in-house and our partners like Dana Incorporated supply us with powertrain from their facility in India. 

Q. Considering Switch is still a young brand in India, how do you map and look at the competition with companies like Tata, Volvo and even Ashok Leyland?  

The EV market is growing very rapidly. I don’t see competition, there has to be a collaboration because everyone has enough market to capture. Our vehicles are very unique. I believe Switch has an advantage because while the market is growing double, we have grown ten times between last year and this year, that’s because of our brand, products, technology and the connected vehicle solution platform Switch iON. 

I strongly believe that the Switch iON connected vehicle platform offers multiple solutions to our fleet operators to enhance the business value proposition. We also offer mobility as a service as a model. All this put together, will give a substantial value proportion to our customers. Customers also feel this that’s why they come to us again. 

Q. How do you see India in terms of the electric commercial vehicle segment?  

The electric commercial vehicle business is going to be very big. In 2030, we are looking at more than USD 26 billion globally between e-buses and LCV segment. That’s why our plan is to expand in areas like Europe, U.K., India and India like growth markets -- Africa, Mid-East, South-East Asia, these are the markets that are going to grow substantially. Hence, investment is going to come to India. We are looking at an investment of around USD 300 million in the Switch facility to develop new products and improve the manufacturing capacity. 

Q. Is Switch Mobility also working to develop charging infrastructure for commercial vehicles in India?  

For charging infrastructure, we are looking at partners who will deploy the infrastructure for us, so that we can focus on the customers' and fleet operators' experience and our partners will be able to get the benefit of a new business model. 

The Government of India has announced that they will support 22,000 charging stations across the country, there are already around 500-1000 charging points available in India. So we will be looking at partners and if anything more is needed, we will look at it in the future. 

Q. What challenges do you see in the electrification plan of India?  

At the initial stage, when the Internal Combustion Engines (ICEs) had come in they would have had much more challenges than what EVs are facing today. With technology, we will be able to solve this problem. The incidents that we are hearing today regarding the safety of EVs are unfortunate, having said that the industry has engineers, scientists, and technologists who will understand, solve the problem and come up with solutions to move forward, I don’t think that is going to derail anything on EV. 

Q. What should the customers expect from switch mobility?  

When you buy Switch Mobility, we can assure you, that you will get the best total cost of operation throughout the life cycle of our vehicle. I believe our platforms are proven and last longer because it’s based on the durability and reliability of Ashok Leyland’s experience. We use advanced technology developed in the U.K. and other aspects globally in India, so we cross-deploy all our technology. 

Q. What could we expect from the brand in the next few months?  

We have just introduced the Switch EiV 12 platform in India which is built on the experience of 50 million electric km globally. The platform has a unique, advanced, global EV architecture to deliver superior efficiency, safety, and reliability. The products in this platform have been designed with cutting-edge technology to deliver a delightful customer experience. Our team is working actively to bring out multiple products as part of the Switch electric intelligent vehicle (EiV) platform in the near future. 

Also, we will be opening an advanced technology and R&D centre in Warwick, U.K. which is the centre of advanced technologies. There we are looking at advanced driver assistance systems, futuristic technologies oriented towards light-weighting, new battery technology and improving efficiency in electric. 

Courtesy: Business World.