How EVs have changed the automotive landscape | Deep Drive Podcast Ep. 85 | Autocar India
Welcome back to Deep Drive, our weekly podcast powered by Kotak Mahendra Prime. Now on this week’s episode, we are going to be talking about EVs. Yes, EVs is a hot topic, but what we’re going to be discussing is how EVs have changed the automotive landscape. I’m Holmar Sarab and I’m Sergis Berto and yes, absolutely. It’s it’s been very interesting. Everyone’s talking about EVs. We’ve been talking about EVs as well for a long. It’s always been focused on the environment, of course, which is why they came about. But beyond that, we we just realized there’s so much more that has happened to the auto industry because of EVs. almost like you could say collateral benefits in this case right I mean we’ve had rise of startups EVs has facilitated uh we’ve had plat platform flexibility coming in uh thanks to electric uh powertrains uh platforms that were earlier locked into say a specific configuration for drivetrains that’s uh unlocked so let’s go through that and the first thing I want to maybe start off with is startups absolutely and I think that’s no more evident than in the two-heer space which we will talk about I I mean Ola to be honest uh uh it’s in a mess right now and largely due to uh the promoter who unfortunately uh you know is someone who can’t be trusted anymore with what he says and what he does but the vision was fantastic and I think uh you know you had a startup which really shook up all the legacy players shot right to the top uh and being the number one EV producer a complete startup so it just showed the potential of course it’s not an easy game and that’s when legacy players, you know, let’s say caught up. We’ve got TVS and Bajage now up ahead and Ola is dropping dropping dropping clearly because they don’t have the engineering chops uh or you know to to to kind of pull it off and besides Ola there’s also Aether and Ultraviolet who have actually done a lot. Absolutely. I think you’re right, you know, how could we miss out on uh talking about them because clearly Aether really solid the way they’ve gone about their product development uh and they’ve done it in a very measured way uh really keeping the product in mind and again it’s shown you know because at the end product is king and they’ve gone ahead of Ola as well so I’m a huge fan of ather but I think the company that I’m really impressed with is ultraviolet you know I mean a great bunch of guys and I’ve been up close uh you know looking at what they’ve done we were involved with their top speed uh record record. I mean 258 to do it’s no mean feat you know because uh it might just be a number but the kind of engineering that has to go into making a bike achieve 258 km and safely and consistently is just phenomenal. So honestly that’s a the the the F99 it’s a techn a technological showcase. It’s not uh really uh ready for market introduction but it just shows what Indian startups can do right uh and you know these guys have just done a phenomenal job you know so all all thanks to the EVI yeah Naran you know I mean there’s this great great bunch of guys and you know uh it makes you proud that you know Indian startups can kind of really uh you know develop a technology like this yeah and you know like you said international brands there are so many more too you know lucid there’s Rivian there’s slate in fact I really love the Slate Auto backed by Amazon. Such a brilliant concept, you know, they’ve taken like the skateboard and literally reimagined everything and for a consumer because technically the concept is you can buy a pickup and tomorrow you could convert it you yourself into an SUV with seats at the back. So the load bay is no longer there. The seats in the back, you’ve got a canopy, a proper SUV. So you know it’s like a slate. They say clean slate. You can just do whatever you want. So and all thanks to EVs, you know, which is good architecture. It’s just unlocks huge possibilities which simply couldn’t have been done earlier. But uh again I think with with cars also it’s been quite interesting surges. Uh we’ve had let’s say some of the Chinese brands like BYD uh it’s the largest imported EV brand today. Uh they’re all imports largely and uh clearly globally also we’ve seen uh random makes which are just were never there earlier. I mean you know phoneaker or was Xiaomi to the thought of phone maker can make a car. Exactly. I think Xiaomi is a classic classic case of how you know you don’t need to have that kind of automotive engineering legacy heritage expertise and experience uh to build something fantastic and uh you know I mean setting a top speed record just the way their cars are and I believe they’re absolutely phenomenal. Right. And I I think almost at the Munich show we saw the the company Keroft I think they said that that was the benchmark now for for tear downs. And I think we were both blown away by the quality there. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Absolutely. It was just just amazing you know what they what they’re building and uh I think uh Sergis uh you know I think let’s talk about also uh what it’s done to let’s say the whole ecosystem. I think for one uh you know cars uh it’s kind of redefined something like acceleration right zero to 100 right uh you know I mean uh is dropping to under 3 seconds for some cars let’s say even an MG cyber which 75 lakh car gives you a 3.2 to uh accelerate to 100 kph. Of course, top speed is not there, but you know, these are the few things which uh really kind of uh open up uh a different kind of uh a different kind of appeal for for customers, you know. I mean, it’s that instant tonk that absolutely, you know, pinned to the back uh of your seat kind of that. Yeah, absolutely. No, absolutely. That that’s the other thing that it’s unlocked. TVs have unlocked performance and like you said onroad instant acceleration but also off-road I mean I’ve been talking to a lot of uh engineers and also luckily enough having driven a lot of these upcoming and launched 4x4s everyone says that if you’re going off-road an EV actually is the better way to go in terms of uh performance you’ve got exactly and you know all four wheels uh exactly You got, you know, you’ve got your torque vectoring, which obviously, you know, a lot of sports cars use, but over here also, you can kind of control the slip uh with each wheel and maximize and optimize traction. Exactly. And and very quickly, in fact, if you look at an ice system internal combustion system, uh to intervene uh in traction, you know, to break and stuff like it’s about 90 to 100 milliseconds apparently, very quick. With an EV, it’s apparently 5 to 8 milliseconds. So it’s it’s it’s it’s almost as it’s it’s it’s happening. You know, you can intervene uh stop the wheel uh put more torque and and every engineer says that that’s that’s what we want. You don’t want the slippage to happen and then a brake intervention. In fact, yeah, a Land Rover for their upcoming uh Range Rover electric. They say that the brake intervention will be as much as I think 60 to 75% less in an electric version because it’s just getting that precise power exactly where it’s needed and surges. And there’s water waiting capability. Honestly, uh do you remember when Dubai had those crazy floods, right? It was the EVs that were going through and all the big high ice SUVs which was flooded because honestly there’s no uh you know let’s say there’s no water ingestion like there is in an engine there’s no water to go up the exhaust no water to come into the intake and cause hydrocar. Yeah. And all these V uh uh EVs or batteries are what they call IP67. Exactly. So they are really kind of catered for uh water waiting and they can be quite deep in water. So it’s really a misnomer. I mean people even think you can get an electric shock if you go into a flat road but you can’t. And in fact for the monsoon there’s nothing better than an EV to get you through. I mean it’s it’s amazing. The Gwagon Orvas the watering capability on the electric is a good 100 mm I think more you know than the ice version. So that’s there you go, you know, it’s it’s like 700 sorry 850 uh mm on the electric and 700 on the ice. So you know and and I think another thing what electrics have done is they have made driving so much easier than any ice you can do. You know, for example, you know, I always say a Tata Nexon is a better automatic than an S-Class. Uh you know, because it’s just linear. You just tap it. There are no gears. There’s no perceptible shift. However imperceptible Mercedes make them. Uh so it’s just the easiest car to drive. The best automatic by far. Exactly. Uh you know, and it’s just I think it just makes driving so much uh simpler. Takes the stress out of it. And I think that’s why a lot of people who got into EVs, they are addicted to it. They can’t go back to a nice vehicle. You know, once you drive an EV in the city, uh that’s what you want. Exactly. And and the other benefit off-road is better gradability. Again, every engineer says that it’s a delight for gradability because of the torque. Uh you know, so you’ve got crazy angles that you can you can tackle as against uh my only issue on off-roaders uh EV off-roaders is the weight. Uh for me, weight is the biggest enemy of off-roading. Uh honestly, carrying a lot of weight can get bogged down. I mean, that’s why a vehicle like the Jimny is just phenomenal off-road. It hasn’t got the power or torque to pull it out of the mud, but then you know it’s so light it can just kind of uh skip uh you know across everything. Correct. So I think you know for me the Jimny has shown that you know light is really a huge huge advantage when you’re off-roading. So I think this is one disadvantage one disadvantage they would have. But I think you’re right overall you know the way you can control the slip the way uh you can control the traction of course ideal would be to have in wheel motors. Uh that’s a concept in EVs that’s not really taken off uh you know very high unsprung weight and the other challenges as well but I think imagine having that you know you could really absolutely uh you know really maximize uh traction and torque. Yeah and you know the one fear for me off-road with an EV uh I’ve always had is the battery being down there and getting maybe punctured or hit. And I I put this to the the Gwagon guys when we were doing this offroad and I said, “Okay, should we take care?” And he’s like, “There’s a huge plate down there.” They said, “It can take the whole weight off the car.” He said, “Frankly, we’ve built it to be like a rock slider.” So you have those rock sliders, you should just skate over. So I mean, yeah, in a in a way, you know, taking care of that. Absolutely. I think, you know, uh, battery packs are better protected than we think they are. Obviously, technology has come a long way. That’s really a very critical component of the car. And I think it’s really encased in probably the best protection you know and it it acts like a stress member as well. So it adds to the torsional stiffness of the vehicle. So I think really it’s a very critical component which obviously uh you know even from a damage point of view it’s well taken care of. Corvas now moving on to another collateral benefit that EVs have brought in is it’s helped legacy manufacturers unlock certain platform restrictions. I mean, we saw that with the Harrier, for example, for a long time. We knew that there was no possibility of them doing a 4×4 or rather too expensive. Yeah, we had said we we in fact, we done a a reel on it. Why they can’t do the 4×4 with an ice engine, the propeller shaft, all that a lot of restriction. But now that’s all freed up because it’s so easy to have a motor in the front, motor at the back, each driving the each axle, front and rear axle, and you’ve got four-wheel drive. Exactly. No propeller shaft running through, no re-engineering the flows, maybe you know creating a central tunnel. Exactly. So I think you’re right, you know, I think EVs unlock a lot of possibilities uh and most importantly at an affordable cost, right? Uh because uh that’s the key thing, you know, because don’t forget uh you know with combustion it’s very very expensive. Firstly, there’s emissions to take care of which is the biggest challenge and uh clearly you don’t have that issue at all in EVs. uh and you know disorderly emissions then you have cafe you have a whole bunch of compliances which you have which makes it very difficult to do low volume uh ice derivatives like a 4×4 and uh surges another thing is uh let’s take the case of Tata again uh with the Nexon their biggest weakness which I think was the engine became their strength exactly you know pulling it out and with the absolutely and if you look at it what’s interesting is that a lot of these car makers or the legacy car makers like Tata Motors and let’s say Mahindra the fastest 0 to 100 times are all EVs yes so they’re doing sub 7 second times and all which is unheard of for ice vehicle to do so again from a performance standpoint we talked about this earlier of course it’s that initial uh kind of acceleration uh I mean we have to say that you can’t you know drive flat out all the time uh the battery discharge charges very fast. There can be overheating as well in which case the power gets cut. So I mean we have to say that there are limitations to performance. Uh but for that initial thrill that initial you know let’s say kick in your kidneys you know your head going back there’s nothing like an EV for whatever brand. Exactly. And you know then moving on to another area or another benefit of EVs beyond environment is it’s just reduced the sheer complexity of the engine. You know I remember Hmas when we when we were studying uh in school we had two textbooks one for chassis which was everything it was about 500 pages I think Kal Singh if I remember the author right and there there was one same thickness only for engines because they’re so complex you’ve got uh intake systems you’ve got ignition systems you’ve got spark advancing retardation you’ve got exhaust to handle you’ve got combustion there’s just so much going on in there that entire engine has been taken out replaced by something as simple as the motor which we know as is as fundamental as the you know electric fan motor right it is absolutely I think the flaws of course is there in the software and the electronics and all that you know which really makes starting to make the difference a completely different world out there but I think what it has done EVs is also kind of leveled the playing field you know I mean it’s made the entry barriers drop dramatically you know so we’ve seen that in the two wheeler space as we said uh and clearly even with vehicles we’ve seen what China has done As I said, you know, brands which you know, you may not have bought if it was a ICE vehicle, you’re open to trying out uh because it’s uh EV and I think BYD is one example. You know, it’s uh despite being just only imports, it’s had a pretty uh decent uh let’s say demand. And uh I think you know if the market opened up to more uh let’s say uh you know EV makers, I’m sure there would be demand for that. Binfast is another example. another example. Yeah, you know, Vietnamese brand, no one really knows. Uh I mean, we still have to see how it fares in the market early days, but what we’ve seen very aggressive pricing uh for a pretty uh you know, straightforward product, seemingly capable, seemingly capable and uh so again, you know, you’ve got these brands which are really outliers who have never really not legacy brands, not part of the mainstream which are coming in. Absolutely. I mean thanks to removing all of that complexity and in fact you know if you if you look at it another benefit by removing all of the hardware or reducing the amount of hardware increasing the software you’re also up to date all of the time right with what been Tesla has been just amazing on that you know all their cars can be updated with just overtheair software updates right performance exactly yeah and you know you’ve got different things like you know talk about changing the landscape imagine having a subscription to pay for more performance or less performance. I mean, it’s crazy. You could never have dreamt of that at I don’t know how far people will accept that. But there are a lot of things you can do with a subscription. True. You know, I mean, you can pay for uh four-wheel steering or not, you know, things like that. small things uh like that which uh because of the software because of the software which you can do and I think that really is uh what we’re going to see with software defined vehicles where you know they’re all future proofed with the heart of the car being you know a massive uh you know central processing unit or central computer which then kind of powers all the different functions of the car which then all can be updated as well. True. And you know even the power train uh you can’t do that with an internal combustion engine. Uh but over the air thanks to maybe software tuning we’ve seen brands like Hyundai Kreta they’ve managed to increase the range 30 km maybe 50 km here but you’re increasing range. So increasing performance it’s not unlocking it but you’re actually increasing it by you know maybe clever metering of uh the power. So, I think that’s a real benefit uh that that’s coming out. Uh not maybe artificially linked to locking certain things, but they’re just seeing incremental benefits. And I I think that’s really something that you know you can look forward to with an EV. You could get a performance boost. Uh you could get a unlock in range uh stuff like that. Absolutely. And I think uh also surges you know to kind of uh uh talk about what also has changed is that uh the kind of center of gravity of product development has shifted or product innovation uh or product excellence whatever way you put it has shifted definitely towards China right the more you go into EVs the more you’re dependent on China because we’ve seen that they are the masters of the game in this. Yeah. So in fact maybe politically that’s collateral damage almost. Yes it is. I mean you know given our geopolitics it’s it’s difficult and in a way I think uh Indian OEMs have to thank this geopolitics because if this market was open to the Chinese they just swamp it with with products that they’re looking you know we’re talking about uh JSW looking at cherry products as well uh you know citroen looking at uh le stellantis looking at leaf motor. So the Chinese are there waiting on the on the wall on the great wall ready to pounce if the opportunity is there. So I think clearly uh you know I think that also is something that is quite a a sobering fact that you know going into EVs it’s great it’s definitely democratized it but in a way what’s happened also it’s that you know Chinese companies are clear leaders even from a supply chain point of view all the cells typically come from China the rare earth magnets all that which EVs so depend on so I think by going EVs you are kind of becoming more dependent on China which as you given the current geopolitics between the two countries isn’t a really uh you know makes you a bit vulnerable right oddly enough also you said they’re waiting on the great wall I think great wall was the one that did fall over they were supposed to come in had people but exactly yeah I mean bra you know who was uh headed gate realized nothing happened and then went and now BMW clearly I mean when you talk to him you know that they had big plans you know and I think what uh what I think EVs have also done is that while you know The batteries are still expensive. Uh overall the costs are really tumbling and you know this coming very close to ice paratin sometimes even better and uh you know I think very soon is going to be deciding whether you want an ice vehicle or an easy vehicle uh depending on what your need is. But I think uh I think it’s going to really change the face of motoring the way people look at it. Uh clearly because u you you’ll want bigger cars. you’re not going to worry about fuel efficiency. You’ll want them as big as possible, as powerful as possible. Okay, they may consume uh a lot more battery juice, but really you don’t feel that as much because it’s so cheap. So I think uh a lot of uh let’s say uh you know mindsets we have are going to change will shift and you mentioned cost that reminds me of another uh sort of benefit going EVs uh to consumers service you don’t have oil changes uh you know coolant change and things like that service costs uh even frequency can come down I mean uh we are yet maybe in early days with EVs so we don’t really know how that will pan out uh in terms of at the end when you do have to maybe change a Will you you know lose all of that? uh but at least in terms of you know your regular service items exactly that’s reduced so that’s reduced and I think one more thing uh surges which uh you touched upon service I think one area which you really conserve are brakes because of regeneration uh you know there not so much load on the brake in fact Volkswagen with the ID4 had drums at the back because drums were inherently a little bit more reliable uh than discs you know especially in in cold weather and and they don’t bind. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh and they said we can get away with drums because the regen is there. The regen is so strong it acts as a brake. So, you’re really saving on braking as well. But on the flip side, you know, with that extra torque, that sudden torque, there is increased tire wear. Tire. So, you know, I think it’s really interesting how uh you know, EVs kind of have an impact on different parts of the car compared to ice vehicles. Yeah, absolutely. In fact, you’re right on the the tireway. Yeah, we are seeing that as well with with the EVs Van uh brakes. In fact, it’s it’s so weird. I remember asking Folkswagen about this thing, you know, drums. Did you do that for cost as well? He said, “No, actually the weird thing is today to make a drum brake is actually more expensive because of the lower volume.” He said, “But we want to do that because the brake shoe stays away from the drum. So, it doesn’t stick because it’s not used. It’s not it’s not getting used.” That’s right. Absolutely. Probably getting interesting. Very interesting point. Yeah. Exactly. and and surges there’s one more factor which uh after driving an EV especially a sedan not an SUV a sedan is the low ground clearance or let me put it away how ridiculous our speed breakers are. Yeah. Uh I mean you know the fact that uh every electric sedan I’ve driven in India has a ground clearance problem it starting with the EQS right uh the i7 uh the uh the i5 right uh you know the M60 uh which was really a rocket but it hit everywhere and in fact I mean here’s a bit of a scoop that BMW are planning to launch the long wheelbased version of the 5 series i5 electric uh but they delayed it by a year because they realized there was a ground clearance issue and they had to re-engineer uh you know the suspension and all to raise the ground clearance because it was an issue. So clearly I think uh it’s not so much the cars because you want the cars to be low. It’s better for aerodynamics which is very very uh critical but uh the fact is that you know people or let’s say the municipalities just do not follow speed breaker guidelines and there are guidelines. There are guidelines they just make them ridiculous mountains. I don’t know how we can stop this but I think there something we should take up and every EV sedan’s underbelly is being hit causing a lot of damage and uh you know I think it’s it’s it’s a major issue obviously that’s why people are gravitating more towards uh electric SUVs uh because otherwise you have a ground clearance problem with a sedan and when the CLA Mercedes comes I think that also could be an issue I don’t know what they’re going to do but uh this is one challenge electric sedans face yeah so absolutely it’s it’s so interesting to Beyond the environmental benefits, there’s so many other benefits that have actually come in or have been plugged in with electric mobility. Right. Exactly. And I think you know EVs we’ve seen how it’s jumped you know with more manufacturers launching EVs. Clearly there’s a demand for them. We are seeing so many more green plates. There’s you know you just constantly see them. They’re always there. At one point it was a rarity but now it’s just so common. Uh so clearly I think we’ve seen the penetration go up to about 6% now. you know I don’t know might not be that much for the whole year but I think it month on month it’s about 66 6% which is quite high so clearly I think you know it’s really kind of turned the auto industry on its head in many ways but even as for a consumer uh there are so many more possibilities there are so many more options and the way we drive our cars the way we enjoy our cars has also changed well that’s it from us on deep drive hope you enjoyed watching this episode and hope to have you join us every Saturday at 11:00 a.m. and to make sure you don’t forget to click on the bell icon to be notified. And you can also follow us on our other podcast platforms, Spotify and Apple Podcast. Thanks for watching. See you again next week, same time.
Electric vehicles might have come into the limelight for zero tailpipe emissions but a deeper look will tell you their wider impact on the entire automotive ecosystem. On this episode of the Autocar Deep Drive Podcast powered by Kotak Mahindra prime, Hormazd Sorabjee – Editor, Autocar India – and Sergius Barretto – Managing Editor, Autocar India – discuss the other facets of EVs.
Archives: Shrey Vaid, Lincon Rodrigues, Ganesh Jadhav
Editor: Deven Bhalla
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Chapters –
0:00 – Introduction
1:14 – EV startups
5:14 – Acceleration
6:20 – Off-road performance
11:25 – Unlocking platform restrictions
13:50 – Reduced complexity
15:50 – Software defined vehicles
17:45 – China’s leadership
19:38 – Price parity with ICE cars
20:20 – Service and maintenance costs
22:20 – EVs vs speedbreakers
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