New Delhi: The Bharat Mobility Global Expo 2025 starting Friday will set the stage for the coming year for the Indian automotive sector, which just witnessed a tepid end to an otherwise bumper year for sales in 2024.
In a market like India that is highly perceptible to new product introductions by manufacturers, the numerous launches lined up for the auto expo are expected to kindle consumer curiosity and excitement, potentially helping buoy sales volumes, experts said.
“New launches are one of the major factors in the Indian automotive industry, as it brings a novelty factory for the customers. Auto expo is the best place to launch a new vehicle or to showcase upcoming vehicles this year,” said Gaurav Vangaal, associate director for light vehicle production forecasting at S&P Global.
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"India continued its auto sales growth post covid from 2021 to 2024. In 2022, we surpassed the pre-covid sales peak and then bettered it in 2023 and 2024. In 2025, we are expecting a better year again, aided by new launches at the auto expo, especially in the ₹15-lakh and higher segment,” he said.
Automakers sold more than 26.1 million units in calendar year 2024, compared with 23.9 million units in 2023, Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (Fada) said in a statement on 7 January. December, however, proved to be a disappointment, with overall retail sales declining 12.4% year-on-year to more than 1.7 million units, as post-festive inventory build-up, delayed harvest payments, and weak consumer sentiment hurt demand across segments.
Returning to New Delhi after a decade of it being hosted in Greater Noida, the show will also mark the return of several large manufacturers after they skipped the event in 2023. These include Mahindra, Skoda, Volkswagen, Mercedes, BMW, Porsche, Hero MotoCorp, Bajaj Auto, and Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India.
The focus on electric mobility, a theme common with previous iterations of the expo, will further intensify this time around as the two highest-selling carmakers bring electric variants of their popular nameplates. Maruti Suzuki will be showing off its first electric car for India, the eVitara, which will be produced by the carmaker in Gujarat. Hyundai will be launching the electric variant of its most successful nameplate in India, the Creta.
In addition to these, numerous other automakers will also be showing off their EV play. Notably, Tata Motors is expected to display the electric variants of its popular Harrier and Safari sport utility vehicles (SUV) as well as its Sierra EV, which was first showcased as a concept at the Auto Expo in 2020.
Experts said that new EV launches will add to the momentum that this segment has been seeing in recent years, but they cautioned against over-optimism.
“It is not that we are going to see a huge boost in the EV market. But we will surely be seeing a sharp acceleration in the EV movement, with several mass-market EV launches and showcases,” said Ravi Bhatia, president, Jato Dynamics, a market intelligence firm.
Global automakers like MG Motor, Skoda, Volkswagen, China’s BYD and Vietnam’s Vinfast will also be showcasing EVs that can soon make their way to India. This marks a departure from the previous years when the dive into electric vehicles space was largely limited to Indian manufacturers Tata Motors and Mahindra.
“Launches of models by most of the OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) in the electric passenger vehicle space would provide a significant boost to the segment. We will see a lot of new choices that the customer will have at different price points,” said Hemal N. Thakkar, senior practice leader and director, Crisil Intelligence.
“This will help push the EV passenger vehicle sales as a proportion of domestic passenger vehicle sales closer to 5% by the end of FY26,” he said.
At just under 100,000 units sold, electric cars accounted for 2.4% of the 4.07 million car sales in India in 2024, as per data from Fada.
Another interesting trend to watch out for at the expo and through 2025 will be the dynamic between EVs and strong hybrid vehicles. While some automakers like Maruti Suzuki and Toyota have lobbied the government for subsidies and tax breaks for hybrids, others like Tata Motors and Mahindra have lobbied to limit such fiscal benefits to EVs only.
"The year needs to be closely monitored between how EVs and strong hybrids fare. There will be multiple new EV launches, and fewer hybrid launches, but in terms of incremental sales volumes, the two segments will be close to each other," S&P's Vangaal said.
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