Three Li-ion battery manufacturers may set up shops in Telangana; to invest Rs 1,500 cr in first phase

Hyderabad: As part of NITI Aayog’s electric vehicle (EV) push  in the country, three different battery (Li-ion) manufacturers with a combined capacity of 10 gigawatt are expected to set up their facilities in Telangana soon with an investment of Rs 1,500 crore in the first phase. Director of Electronics, Telangana, Sujai Karampuri, withholding the names of the companies, said the construction of three different facilities is expected to begin in a month or two and production of the cells would begin between nine to 15 months after that. He also indicated that the initial production capacity would be ramped up from one gigawatt in phase one to 10 gigawatt in the due course with a total investment of Rs 6,000 crore. [caption id=“attachment_4020685” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters[/caption] “Right now they are in the pipeline. We will disclose the names in a matter of month or so. All the three companies put together, it is over Rs 1,500 crore investment,” Karampuri told reporters here on Wednesday. “The construction would probably start in a month or so. It takes typically 9 months to 15 months to come up to the production stage. The combined capacity would approximate 10 gigawatts,” he added. “First they’ll start with one gigawatt in the first phase, then they go up to 5 gigawatts. There will be investing Rs 1500 crore in the first phase. But it would translate approximately Rs 6000 crore, total put together for all three phase,” he said on the sidelines of ‘Electric vehicle Summit-2019.’ The Telangana government had recently informed the NITI Aayog that it was capable of setting up a Giga-Scale Li-ion Battery Manufacturing Plant as envisioned by the Centre. Karampuri said the state government is developing a 200-acre park for EVs, which can further be developed to 800 acres in future. Telangana Principal Secretary for IT and Industries Jayesh Ranjan said, the state government is implementing various measures and incentives for electric vehicles and related ecosystem under the State’s EV Policy, though officially not launched.