German luxury car maker, Mercedes Benz is going to assemble its EVs in India. With this, the company’s first base to assemble its EVs outside Germany would be India. The assembly plant is in Pune, where it will assemble the electric sedan EQS 580.
Venkatesh Kulkarni, ED and Head of Operations, Mercedes-Benz India, said, “Globally, EQS is manufactured at the company’s mother plant in Sindelfingen, Germany. India will be the first assembly base after Germany.” Globally, the luxury carmaker operates with six completely knocked down units (CKD) plants. The import of cars as CBU (Completely Built Unit) attracts a higher tax in India while for the cars that are assembled in the country as CKD, their effective import duty is comparatively lower.
Mercedes-Benz EQS 580 is launched at a stated price of INR 1.55 crore(ex-showroom). It is the second electric model in the company’s portfolio and comes to India in an SKD kid to be assembled at the Pune plant. With an ARAI-certified range of 857 km, it gets the highest range of any EV on sale in India. However, the WLTP (Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicle Test Procedure) real-world conditions range stands at 677 km. The model, produced at the company’s Sindelfingen plant is sold out for the year. For Indian customers too, it will come with a waiting period.
Assembly plant
As of now, the physique store is working in two shifts, and the meeting store which is working in a single shift will go for two shifts from October, indicating the demand and the necessity to improve the manufacturing throughout the festive season. Mercedes-Benz entered the luxurious EV house in India with its EQC SUV as a completely imported automobile in October 2020 priced at INR 1.07 crore.“Right now we do not have any plan to locally assemble EQC but further EV models are lined up in the years to come,” the corporate’s head of operations stated.
Last month, the carmaker launched the all-electric efficiency sedan, Mercedes-AMG EQS 53 4MATIC+, which is imported as a totally constructed unit (CBU). In the final quarter of this calendar yr, the corporate is scheduled to launch the EQB SUV, which will probably be its first 7-seater providing for the EV portfolio in India.
The luxurious carmaker earlier stated that it has invested INR 15 crore along with its franchise companions to construct up a charging community of 140 chargers throughout the nation by the tip of 2022. Going ahead, the market chief within the luxurious automobile phase goals to have the most important quick charging OEM community in India by the tip of the yr – over 20 chargers of 180 kW ultra-fast DC and 60 kW quick DC every, along with over 100 AC chargers of twenty-two kW.
