India becomes a battleground for EVs as JSW enters the fray

The steel and energy company JSW Group plans to invest 400 billion rupees, or $4.8 billion, to build a car and battery complex.

Without Tesla and BYD, local and international companies are vying for market share in India's growing EV industry.

Group Chairman Sajjan Jindal told Nikkei that JSW wants to produce 300,000 passenger cars and 100,000 commercial vehicles annually. The state of Odisha in the east will host the facility.

On February 10th, the corporation declared that it had inked a memorandum of understanding with the state government regarding an EV project, promising to provide 11,000 employment opportunities.

There are also plans to build a 50 gigawatt-hour EV battery factory, though the start of operations has not been made public.

An additional steel factory in Odisha is run by the group's steel business. In a statement, it said that it places Odisha at the forefront of India's green technology and electric vehicle industries.

In addition, JSW Steel manufactures electrical steel sheets for use in motors and other products, establishing cost and procurement efficiencies across group companies in the production of high-performance sheets as well as steel for vehicle bodies.

In India, over 80,000 electric vehicles were sold in 2022, double the number that was predicted by the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations of India. These numbers suggest that JSW's output is ambitious.

Additionally, JSW intends to invest in a position greater than thirty percent in MG Motor's Indian affiliate, which is owned by SAIC Motor of China. Additionally, rumors have it that JSW and Volkswagen are in discussions to form a joint venture in the electric vehicle industry.