Tesla Motors to enter Indian market with a third generation car

Tesla Motors is well known in the electric car industry. Few weeks ago, it made headlines  across the world for making most of its patents public, as they believed this would benefit the electric car industry worldwide. Now it plans to enter the Indian market with a launch of a new car that has been codenamed – Tesla Model 3.

The Tesla Model 3 is a third generation four-door electric car and is small and more affordable than rest of its range. This model is targeted specifically at emerging markets like India and is expected to be priced between Rs 18 lakh and 24 lakh. 

The American electric car manufacturer believes that India is a very important market and has potential but it needs more affordable and economical cars. However, it is difficult for them to import a car directly from their US and Netherland plants due to the 100 per cent custom duties in the country. Tesla is planning to have a local assembly in the country but before that happens, the company needs a definite policy from the government to support electric vehicles in the future. 

"Our target price for Model 3 is in the range of $30,000 to $40,000 (Rs 18-24 lakh) that makes it an ideal product in the luxury car segment. India is a huge potential market, but we need to have more affordable and economical cars," said Jay Vijayan, chief information officer, Tesla Motors.

The National Electric Mobility Mission Plan (NEMMP) is a plan made by the government where it plans to sell 6-7 million electric vehicles by 2020. However, this plan remains in a sad state as it is yet to be approved, leave alone implementing it.