Bajaj Chetak outsells the TVS iQube for the first time

September 2024 witnessed retail electric two-wheeler sales of 88,156 units. This is a 40 percent increase over last year's 63,184 units. In the calendar year to date, September 2024 retails are the third highest monthly numbers after March 2024 (1,37,741 units) and August (87,256 units). The slowdown in sales has impacted market leader and volume driver Ola Electric.

Let’s take a closer look at each of the top six players, who are the movers and shakers of the e-two-wheeler industry.

1. Ola Electric market share falls from 38 percent to 27 percent
2. 18,933 Bajaj Chetaks sold in September 2024
3. Ather Energy sales increase by 75 percent over last year

Ola Electric: 23,965 units, up 29 percent YoY

The recently listed Ola Electric is having a torrid time, particularly in the past two months. The market leader, which averaged monthly sales of 37,695 units in the first seven months of CY2024, saw demand fall sharply in August (26,928 units) and September (23,965 units). This has seen the company’s YoY growth slow down substantially from 105 percent in June and 112 percent in July, to 46 percent in August and 29 percent in September.

Ola’s September 2024 retails are its lowest monthly sales in 11 months after October 2023’s 23,594 units. This drop in sales has impacted its market share substantially. Ola’s share of e-two-wheeler retails in September was 27 percent, down from the 38 percent it commanded in March and July 2024. In August 2024, Ola’s market share was 31 percent.

In September, Ola became the first Indian EV maker to surpass 3 lakh unit sales in a calendar year.

Bajaj Auto: 18,933 units, up 166 percent YoY

We have been forecasting for over a year that Bajaj Auto is the dark horse of both the electric two- and three-wheeler market. In September 2024, the Pune-based company crossed longstanding No 2 manufacturer, TVS Motor Co, selling 18,933 Bajaj Chetaks compared to TVS’s 17,865 iQubes. In August, Bajaj was just 791 units behind TVS. This gives Bajaj Auto and TVS Motor Co a September market share of 21.47 percent and 20.26 percent, respectively.

In July 2024, the Bajaj Chetak rode past the 2 lakh-unit wholesales milestone in the domestic market. Launched just before the pandemic struck, Bajaj Auto’s first electric scooter took four years to achieve 1 lakh sales. The next 1,00,000-unit despatches have come in a scant eight months as a result of new variants and an expanded retail sales network. July 2024’s 20,114 units have been the Chetak’s highest monthly despatches yet.

TVS Motor Co: 17,865 units, up 15 percent YoY

TVS Motor Co's 17,865 iQube sales in September makes for 15 percent YoY growth (September 2023: 15,523 units). Month-on-month, TVS’ September retails are up 2 percent (August 2024: 17,441 units) but down 8 percent on July 2024’s 19,444 units (its best month in the year to date).

In CY2023, TVS had sold a total of 1,65,761 iQubes – 93,824 units more than the Bajaj Chetak. That yawning gap now stands sizeably reduced in the current calendar year – to 24,595 units.

The company, which expects two-wheeler EV sales in India to reach 30 percent market share by CY2025, is targeting a big jump in the contribution of EV sales to its overall volumes over the next two years.

Ather Energy: 12,579 units, up 75 percent YoY

Ather Energy had clocked its best monthly sales in the first six months of FY2025. The company has seen its monthly retails grow right from April 2024 (4,143 units). In September, the e-scooter maker sold 12,579 units, up 75 percent YoY (September 2023: 7,169), which gives it a market share of 14 percent compared to 11 percent a year ago.

Cumulative January-September 2024 retails at 85,817 units are up 7 percent YoY (January-September 2023: 80,017 units), which gives it a market share of 11 percent of the total retails of till end-September.

Hero MotorCorp: 4,174 units, up 683 percent YoY

The world’s largest two-wheeler manufacturer and the last of the big legacy players to enter the EV market is seeing demand pick up for its Vida brand of e-scooters. The company, which sold 4,174 units in September, clocked 683 percent YoY growth on a low year-ago base of 533 units. Market share has risen to 4.73 percent from 0.68 percent in September 2023.

Hero MotoCorp has started scaling up brand presence for Vida and its network now stands at 203 touchpoints comprising 180 dealers across 116 cities. The company, which has the V1 Plus and V1 Pro EVs, plans to expand its portfolio in FY2025. And it already has around 2,500 charging stations in collaboration with Ather Energy, in which Hero MotoCorp is an early investor.

Greaves Electric Mobility: 2,606 units, down 24 percent YoY

Greaves Electric Mobility, which was ranked fifth for quite some time, has lost its position to Hero MotoCorp. In September, the company sold a total of 2,606 e-scooters, down 24 percent YoY (September 2023: 3,447 units). GEM’s latest product is the new Ampere Nexus e-scooter launched on April 30. Its cumulative 9-month sales at 22,244 units are an 85 percent increase over the 12,042 units in the January-September 2023 period. Its market share currently stands at 3 percent.

Electric two-wheeler sales in India to cross 10 lakh units in 2024

October 2024 will see India e-2W Inc ride past the industry’s record CY2023’s retail sales of 8,48,003 units. At the end of September, with cumulative January-September sales of 7,99,103 units, the difference was just 48,900 units, which will easily be achieved by mid-October.

That’s not all. Given the current momentum, the long-term wallet-friendly USP of an EV compared to petrol (currently priced at Rs 103.44 a litre in Mumbai), along with the growing EV charging infrastructure, the annual sales should hit the 10 lakh-unit mark for the first time in a calendar year.

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