Indian carmaker Mahindra & Mahindra is prospecting investment partners for its domestic electric vehicles business and is finalizing investment plans for its luxury electric vehicle line Automobili Pininfarina unit.
Mahindra wants to be a pivotal player in mass-market electric vehicles (EVs) through its unit Mahindra Electric and in the high-end segment through Europe-based Pininfarina, which is building an electric hypercar, Battista.
Mahindra & Mahindra is soliciting financial or strategic investors for Mahindra Electric while for Pininfarina, the automaker will look for another strategic partner after it concludes on how much investment it needs for future projects and decides how to raise funds.
In June, Mahindra & Mahindra said that it ready for a reboot as it was evaluating all its businesses and would continue to invest only in those where it sees a strategic advantage or can get an 18% return. It has said that EVs are strategic to their growth.
As part of this evaluation, Mahindra has also decided not to proceed with the bid made by its North American unit to supply vehicles to the U.S. Postal Service.
The automaker said that the project would have required an investment of close to $500 million and given “the current environment and the focus on capital allocation” it would not have met the company’s targeted return on investment. The North American business is also under review and Mahindra is expected to provide more clarity on its future once lawsuit with carmaker Fiat Chrysler in that region is settled.
