JSW MG Motor India, a joint venture between JSW Group and SAIC Motor, aims to double the capacity at the Halol plant in Gujarat to 2.20 lakh per annum by January 2028.
JSW Group said that the talks with SAIC Motor on the acquisition of an additional stake in the company are still on and nothing has been finalised as yet.
The diversified conglomerate holds a 35 per cent stake in MG Motor India and SAIC Motor owns 49 per cent, with the remaining stake held by other Indian investors, dealers and employees.
“Currently, the total investment and the ongoing investments that are being made by MGI are to the tune of Rs 3,500 crore. On top of our investment, our vendors are investing close to 2,500 crores as well. So, overall there is about a Rs 6,000 crore investment that is being made due to JSW MGI’s requirement, partly by our vendors and partly by us,” Parth Jindal, Director, JSW MG Motor India, told reporters during a media interaction post the launch of Hector Tomahawk in EV and PHEV (Plug-in-hybrid).
Hector Tomahawk is the first product built on the company’s newly developed Advanced Drive Architecture Platform Technology (ADAPT) and India’s first multi-new Energy vehicle (NEV) platform.
Tomahawk EV and PHEV come with a price tag of Rs 19.49 lakh and Rs 2.70 lakh, respectively. Parth said part of this investment is also going to augment the Halol plant capacity.”Today we have a capacity of 110,000 units in Halol. By March, this capacity will get to 1,60,000 units. And by January 2028, this capacity will reach 2,20,000 units (per annum),” he said.
The company, at least for the next 3-4 years, does not see the need for a new location as the Halol plant itself can go to about 4,00,000 units per annum, according to Parth.
“But once, as soon as we start hitting 2,50,000 plus, which I hope is not too long in the future, we will make that decision,” Parth stated.
He said that the original investment, a mix of debt and equity, that was made into the company is sufficient for this phase of expansion, and added that “we had equity remaining from the original investment that JSW made into MG. So, this phase is covered by that.”
Stating that there is no change in the shareholding, Parth said, “For any future thing beyond this, the discussions are on between both the shareholders on how to handle that.”
“Both shareholders remain very keen on supporting the India business and want this business to really grow. I think from an SAIC standpoint, they see India as the next engine for growth for their company,” he added.
“But as of now, the talks are between both shareholders and it’s at the discussion stage only,” he said.
He said that the company’s focus is to continue to grow volumes between 35-40 per cent CAGR.
Path said the issue is supply-side and not the demand-side and added that last year the company clocked 71,000 units and sounded confident that this year it crossed 95,000 units.
“Hopefully the target is 100,000 cars. That’s the mantra that we’ve taken as MG. So, it’s phenomenal growth,” he said.
He added that while the company is very keen to make cells in India, the technology on LFP is not available anywhere in the world outside of China, which is guarding it like a “weapon”.
“But our cell-to-pack assembly line of JSW Energy for battery storage as well as our cell-to-pack facility for MG, both have already been commissioned by the company,” Parth said.