Prime Upshots
- Himanshu Patel, CEO, Triton shares the corporate strategy about its planning to gain ground in India with a mammoth $1 billion earmarked to erect and equip a manufacturing hub in India,
- Patel reckons Triton N4 Model to stand out among the rest of carmakers, in terms of unique design and features palatable to Indian needs,
- He sheds light on the presence of solar panel which would be purposefully placed there, to churn about 1.3 kilowatts per hour with the intention of offsetting losses to be suffered in mileage.
Following global green footprint, Indian buyers too express a great leaning towards electronic vehicles (EVs) and with pollution rising above normal levels, such an option seems more judicious.
With preparations on to sail into Indian shores, he presents his hopes for the product as, ”We’ve really talked through every component, like from the grid infrastructure, to the conditions of the roads, of India.
Triton is a car brand based in US but which is all set to traverse this side of the planet with destination specific to India, with its notable brand offering Sedan N4.
Now, while commenting on his unique automobile, Mr. Patel teems with joy, “We ‘re building this car based on every component of India’s infrastructure.”
This is worth mentioning that these Triton cars will have solar panels on the top which is going to be the deciding factor among all others running the competition.
One shouldn’t be surprised at all as to why the company considers this to be an opportune time to step into Indian market, alongside Tesla led by Elon Musk and then even as Tata’s mull over unveiling a bevy of EVs in this year. But Mr. Patel thinks otherwise, “the Indian carmakers are just trying to make a very cheap price point to enter the market just like Tatas or any other manufacturers in India. I think that’s the wrong approach in my opinion”.
Shedding more light, he continued, ”In a majority of the cities people are sitting on an average four to five hours a day in traffic and you have extremely high heat during those times, what happens to your power consumption of your battery? It does chew it up because AC uses quite a bit of power. And, we use solar panel technology on the roof of our car to address that issue. I just think that you know a lot of those guys are not considering those things”.
As mentioned above, Triton plans to push around $1 billion in establishing its manufacturing facility in India and for ancillary assistance; talks are underway with Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL). Further, the facility is expected to be present in various Indian states and discussions are on with respective state governments for such a purpose, however, which those states are, is still not disclosed.
Preparations are made and all lengthy, bulky, legal paper work comprising of reams and reams of paper alongside virtuous brainstorming into it, has been carried out too. Not surprisingly, y the end of this year, we can expect the delivery of such EV as production is likely to start within 3 to 5 months.
Outlined With A Promise, Powerful Battery To Last Long:
Solar panel to be fitted onto the car, tends to generate upto 1.3 kilowatts every hour which would reduce AC from 3 KW draw to 1.3 KW draw and for this feature, Mr. Patel reveals, “ This offsets the losses of mileage or kilometres in India. By just doing this, we’re saving about close to 30% of the battery for being used during traffic times”.
Clearly, the EV industry is deeply well-versed with the use of solar panels but such is likely to be a novel approach in India. Major car manufacturer from Korea Hyundai, has fitted solar roofs in its Sonata Hybrid which is, but yet to make its presence felt in India, though the countries of US and other mega markets are well stocked with its optimum supply.
Solar Panels to Fuel The Battery !! Is It So?
Undoubtedly, even though solar panels will be fitted to ease battery load, but such won’t be sufficient for the car to utilize solar panels for its sole operations. This is the point that makes us lose our hearts here. The underlying effort is to support the idea of going green, but then, the existing EV framework in India is going to be a major challenge. Going by the data, across India, we have got only 650 spots available for public to charge their EVs.
Notwithstanding, Mr. Patel unravelled the fat fact that discussions are on with scores of prominent dealers in major cities to establish world-class dealer outlet for them and to enable their EV fast chargers.
He maintained, “And basically you know what our goal is to not only have multiple dealership outlets, but also, have satellite dealership outlets. So the satellite dealership outlets means that you have less infrastructure, but you have charging stations. We feel this is gonna be a very good starting point to get people to be able to get fast charging from ourselves a far as our building goals”.
Besides, the company struggles to partner with other such charging companies in India in cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad and in states like Karnataka and Gujarat.
