Uber Joins Hands With Mahindra To Launch Electric Cars

Uber, the global taxi aggregator, will be tying up with car manufacturer Mahindra and Mahindra to launch electric cabs in Delhi and Hyderabad. The companies have entered a partnership to deploy 100 Electric Vehicles (EV) in the Uber fleet under its pilot project.

Mahindra’s e20 Plus hatchback and the eVerito sedan will be inducted into the Uber fleet and will hit the roads by February 2018. Speaking about the collaboration, Uber’s Chief Business Officer for India and Emerging Markets, Madhu Kannan said, “We see a key role for high efficiency vehicle technologies and therefore, believe that this collaboration with Mahindra, the pioneers in the electric vehicles space, will be truly beneficial not just for Uber, but for our driver partners, riders and the cities we operate in.”

However, both the companies have agreed the partnership is not exclusive as Mahindra has already tied up with Ola to introduce an EV fleet in Nagpur. Mahindra has been at the forefront of manufacturing electric vehicles in the country and launched their electric hatchback e2o in 2013. Speaking about the new partnership with Uber, Mahindra and Mahindra’s Managing Director Dr. Pawan Goenka said, “Our collaboration with Uber is an important step to help accelerate the large scale adoption of electric vehicles on shared mobility platforms and meet the nation’s vision for EVs.“

The driver partners on Uber’s platform can avail a package which will include Mahindra electric vehicles at competitive prices, attractive financing and insurance premiums, under this partnership. Private players in the process of setting up a common use charging ecosystem across multiple locations in the cities will also be contacted by the companies. Mahindra is also planning to ramp up the production capacity to 5000 units a month from the current capacity of 500 units. Furthermore, Mahindra and Mahindra will also support driver education and training related to various aspects of electric vehicles including maintenance.