It has only been three years since Ola Electric launched with a promise to put a million electric vehicles on the road by 2021 and produce 10 million annually by 2022. But a week into the start of deliveries of its flagship electric scooter, built by what it hopes will become the world’s largest scooter factory, Ola Electric is reportedly facing a delay of several weeks for mass production.
According to a Bloomberg report, citing anonymous sources, the company may see mass production pushed back to at least January. The company reportedly is making just 150 vehicles a day, even though it has an order book of around 90,000 scooters, which it has promised to fulfil by February. According to the report, the company’s body shop is running at half capacity while the paint shop is not operating.
Ola Electric’s $330 million mega factory in Chennai began churning out scooters last week. The company is working on India’s largest EV charging network with 100,000 charging points across 400 cities (the company has already begun sharing images of its scooters reaching customers in Pune, Hyderabad, Vishakapatnam, Chennai and Bengaluru.)
Ola Electric does not plan on sharing this network with its EV-producing competition, ending hopes of a standardised charging network for EVs as a whole.
For the Ola S1, the company promises a top speed of 115 km/.h, a range of 181km, and a 0-40km/h dash in three seconds. The dash is another innovation, with “MoveOS” allowing for a customisable interface. The Ola S1 electric scooter comes in two trims—S1 and S1 Pro—carrying a price tag of Rs 99,999 and Rs 1,29,999, respectively.
On December 16, founder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal acknowledged the delays but promised that the company would make India a world leader in EVs.
“We did get delayed by a month from our initial promise. A delay is a delay and we will ensure we do our best to meet our own very tight timelines and high quality standards,” he tweeted.
“We’re still at the start of our journey and will slip occasionally on timelines, and there will be improvements we will need to make in our products. But we will keep pushing in our efforts to make world class products, innovate on technology and make India a world leader in EVs!”