The company sees its scooters, which have witnessed strong demand for both internal combustion and electric versions, as one of the ‘growth vectors’ and expects over 50 per cent of its overall scooter sales to be electric by 2030, Chitale told PTI in an interview.
With low-emission powertrains emerging as a trend across the industry, he said, Hero MotoCorp is also working on a variety of options “to stay ahead of the curve” as a market leader.
“So far we are leading, and we hope we continue to do so going forward,” he said when asked if Hero MotoCorp is ready to defend its leadership position as competition intensifies in the Indian two-wheeler market.
While declining to comment on competitors, Chitale said,”We will stay focused on doing what’s right for the customer. We stay focused on offering the most efficient, most safe products. We have a great momentum so far. I can’t talk about others, but I can talk about confidence in our channel, our products.”
Noting that “competition is definitely intense”, he said, “From SIAM data, it appears that our lead over competitors has again widened last year (FY26). While it had kept coming down, narrowing over six-seven years, and the lead had shrunk, in FY26 again the curve turned, and again marginally the lead widened.”
Hero MotoCorp is “widening” the gap to competitors on the back of growth that the company is driving in categories such as scooters in both ICE and electric, bikes in 125 cc and above categories, while also continuing to push entry-level commuter motorcycles, he added. As per the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) data, Hero MotoCorp sold 54,93,178 units of motorcycles and 5,72,870 units of scooters in FY26. Rival Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India Pvt Ltd sold 25,89,985 units of motorcycles and 31,62,067 units of scooters in FY26.
When asked about the growth outlook for FY27, Chitale said, “Looking at the momentum and some of the categories in which we are driving growth, and we do expect to continue our momentum of double-digit growth that we had in FY26 to continue in FY27 as well.”
It will come on the back of “strong growth in exports, strong growth in EV, very strong growth in scooters”, Chitale added.
On new product launches, he said, “Typically, in a year, we have 10 to 12 big launches, new models… this year also we have a very active pipeline… it may be a little more, maybe even more than that.”
Besides, he said, in a year there are refreshes of existing models, “which gets our number of launches in a year typically to 40-50 launches”.
Highlighting scooters as a “growth vector” for Hero MotoCorp, he said the company is doubling capacity for its Xoom scooter brand, while it has completed 50 per cent capacity expansion for Destiny.
“By the end of this month, we would have increased our capacity in Vida (electric scooter) by 50 per cent and on track to further double it by the end of this calendar year, almost three times from the start of the year to where we end this year,” he noted.
The rapid expansion in capacity is to ensure that “this entire demand momentum that we see both for our ICE scooters as well as EV scooters” is met, Chitale added.
The company has earmarked Rs 1,500 crore capex for FY27 to double its scooter production capacity.
When asked about the growth prospects of electric scooter Vida and its contribution to overall sales, he said, “Today it is about 27-28 per cent. I can see that becoming the majority by 2030…more than 50 per cent. We are moving in that direction.”
Stating that the company has adopted a ‘town by town’ approach to expand EV sales network, he said, “Our ambition is to emerge as one of the top three players, if not number one, in EV in every category, and that’s the approach we are taking even now.”
Stating that the electric two-wheeler segment is evolving at a fast pace, Chitale said Hero MotoCorp sees the industry to grow in double digit and the company will aim to outgrow that pace and gain market share.