Mercedes-Benz to rev up sales of electric vehicles in India

With plans afoot to locally assemble its all-electric sedan EQS in India, luxury carmaker Mercedes-Benz is looking to accelerate sales of electric vehicles in the country, according to a senior company official.

Mercedes-Benz India plans to bring to the market the locally assembled EQS electric sedan in the fourth quarter of 2022 to add to the all-electric SUV EQC, which was launched as a fully imported unit in October 2020 priced at Rs 1.07 crore.

“We have taken a step by step approach in developing electric vehicle strategy in India. EQC was first available in six markets in India and gradually expanded. Now we are in 50 cities with the EQC and the next step is to expand the portfolio with a car, which we believe has a stronger volume appeal and producing it locally,” said Martin Schwenk, MD-CEO, Mercedes-Benz India.

Elaborating further on the electrification plans, he said, “When we did the rollout of the brand EQC we actually looked into what safe numbers we can expect. We do the same in the EQS. At the end, you have to think of which car has a volume aspiration that makes sense for local production.”

The EQS will be launched in the Q4 of 2022 and it will be assembled at the company’s plant at Chakan in Maharashtra. “It is a car with completely different characteristics. It’s a luxury sedan and it has a different customer base and we would also expect a broader base of interest. So the local production makes sense,” Schwenk said.