Billionaire Elon Musk-led Tesla is gearing up to launch its first showroom in India’s Mumbai as early as mid-July. The first set of Tesla cars, including ModelY rear-wheel drive SUVs, has already been shipped to India from the EV maker’s China factory, Bloomberg reported, citing sources. This will mark Tesla’s much-awaited entry into the Indian electric vehicle market at a time when the giant is struggling with sales in Europe and China.
Following the launch of the Mumbai showroom, the next in line would be the one in Delhi. Apart from cars, the global EV giant has also imported Supercharger components, car accessories, merchandise and spares from the US, China and the Netherlands, Bloomberg reported, citing a document.
This comes at a time when Tesla, in the past few months, has strengthened its bet on the world’s third-largest automobile market. Tesla’s ModelY is the world’s largest selling electric car. Five Model Y vehicles have reportedly arrived in Mumbai from Tesla’s factory in China and were declared at Rs 2.77 million and attracted more than Rs 2.1 million in import duties—a levy that’s consistent with India’s 70% tariff on fully-built imported cars under $40,000 plus surcharges, the documents cited by Bloomberg revealed.
The development comes just days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Tesla boss Elon Musk in the United States.
While Tesla is gearing up for launch, its premium-priced car might face hurdles to convince value-driven consumers to make purchases. Presently in India, EVs account for just around 5% of the new passenger vehicle sales and on top of tha,t premium cars represent just 2%, according to the government’s vehicle registration portal.
