Discussions around electric vehicles (EV) grew 28 per cent in the Asia-Pacific region in 2022 compared to the previous year, a new analysis showed.
The trend was buoyed by fuel price hikes, energy supply crunch and electric mobility’s position as a leading solution to decarbonise and check global warming, according to analysts with GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company, wrote.
Indian companies held the most number of discussions (320) on the topic, followed by China (154), Australia (128), Hong Kong (124), Taiwan (99) and Japan (68), according to the GlobalData Company Filings Database.
The companies also focused their planning around EV-related infrastructure such as battery production, charging stations, battery swapping among others, analysts with the data firm shared.
Misa Singh, Analyst at GlobalData, said:
There is heavy investment in battery manufacturing as the demand for lithium-ion batteries is on the rise due to the growth in EVs. Furthermore, companies are looking forward to hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles.
Some of the leading auto manufacturers in the region have clear strategies for their electric mobility vertical, the analysis showed.
Indian automobile manufacturer Mahindra and Mahindra, for instance, is planning to launch five electric sports utility vehicles (SUV), one of the more popular consumer vehicle segments, by 2026-27, GlobalData noted.
The company is hiring 900 engineers to develop new electric product capabilities and strengthen EV skills at its R&D facility Mahindra Research Valley (MRV) in Chennai, the analytics firm shared.
Zhongsheng Group Holdings, a Beijing-based automotive retail and services company, reported that the group’s sales volume of EVs increased by 54 per cent in the first half of 2022, it noted..
“XPeng Inc, a China-based smart EV company, discussed the delivery of 98,553 EVs during the first three quarters of 2022 — a growth of 75 per cent from the same period last year,” the analysis mentioned.
Hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles are a growing market with strong long-term growth potential for heavy vehicles, Viva Energy Australia Group was recorded as saying.
Hong Kong-based CLP Holdings discussed a joint venture with the manufacturer of smart equipment Qingdao TGOOD Electric Company for launching electric vehicle charging networks, GlobalData shared.
The market share of Gogoro, a Taiwan-based company, and its vehicle partners went up last year, the company reported. “In the first nine months of 2022, they accounted for 92.4 per cent of all sales of electric vehicles,” according to the statement shared by the data analysis company.
Japanese automobile giant Suzuki Motor Corp is investing $100 million in EVs and battery manufacturing, the analysis showed. “By 2025, the company also intends to launch EVs in India,” it added.
Transport contributes to a quarter of the global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions, the Paris Declaration on Declaration on Electro-Mobility and Climate Change & Call to Action of 2015 recognised.
In order to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels, at least 20 per cent of all road transport has to be electric, the document mentioned.