Blue Circle – the world’s first sector-specific professional networking platform in partnership with Log9 Materials – India’s leading battery technology startup, and HERO ELECTRIC – India’s top electric scooter company today hosted EVConIndia 2022 – Electric Vehicle Conference in Gurugram, India. The agenda of EVConIndia 2022 focused and revolved around Reassurance on Range Anxiety, Vehicular Strength, and Battery Safety for 2 Wheelers; Building Batteries for Indian Use-Cases; Roadmap for 4-wheelers Mass Adoption; Advancing the electrification of E-Commerce; Role of Finance in India’s Transition to Electric Vehicles; and Overcoming Regulatory, Technical & Commercial Challenges for EV Charging Infrastructure. This conference was addressed by eminent industry leaders and experts.
On this occasion, a whitepaper by Alvarez and Marsal, a global professional services firm and the Knowledge Partner at EVConIndia 2022, was also launched. It highlights some key challenges affecting EV adoption and talks about six key issues: affordability, range anxiety, supply chain, product safety & quality, and inadequate access to financing. The whitepaper has pointed out that India requires to setup 46,000 EV charging stations by 2030 to reach the global benchmark. Currently EV/Public charger ratio is 6 both for China & Netherlands, 19 for the US while it stands 135 for India. Which means there is one charger per 135 EVs in India as compared to 6 in China. The paper also provides resolutions and recommendations to architect the roadmap of the industry.
On this occasion, Siddharth Anand, Founder and CEO, Blue Circle said, “EVConIndia provides the confluence of thought leaders and practitioners from all relevant areas to map the EV ecosystem and come up with a roadmap for the mass manufacturing and adoption of EVs in India. We are overwhelmed with the response and have achieved our objective of bringing multi-sector stakeholders together to assess the challenges and chart the way forward together The conference not only enabled a well-considered dialogue but also advanced the agenda concretely forward”.
“The industry and the government should come together to initiate a public awareness campaign which captivatingly highlights EV’s ecological advantage, economic rationale and their national necessity (in establishing energy security). The evolving campaign should also credibly address concerns, which are bound to emerge around any new technology. The ball in this regard has already started rolling today. The point is to maintain the momentum going forward,” said Pavan Choudary, Chairman, Blue Circle.
“EVConIndia has been a very promising platform that brings together think tanks from the EV industry and creates an ecosystem for stimulating talks and discussions. We are glad to have partnered in this endeavour.” said Dr Akshay Singhal, Founder and CEO, Log9 Materials.
Speaking at EVConIndia 2022, Sudhendu J Sinha, Adviser (Infrastructure Connectivity & Electric Mobility), NITI Aayog, said, “The grand aspiration of the country is expressed through the government announcements and policies, which are very clear. We want to use these disruptive times to become the manufacturing hub of the world. We want to be leading exporter (nation) for EV components and batteries”.
Mr Sinha further explained that to achieve that aspiration, “it is vital that the quality standards are top-notch, the businesses must have better control over the supply chain, and ethics should be the unshakable backbone of the industry”.
The Start-up REV Program supported by Indian Angel Network witnessed animated participation by 100+ startups and showcased their innovative ideas. Out of which 6 startups were shortlisted for the final round of presentation and winners will get the opportunity to raise funds between Rs 25 lakhs and Rs 7 crores.
