Tata aims to capitalise the electric vehicle market with the Jayem Neo

By Jayraj Patel

Tata Motors and Jayem Automobiles are set to introduce the electric version of the famous ‘Tata Nano’ for the Indian roads. The new model, renamed as ‘Jayem Neo’, will be inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Former Tata Sons chairman Ratan Tata at a special event in Hyderabad, next week.

‘Jayem Neo’ will hit the streets of Delhi by the end of next month, as India’s largest cab aggregator, Ola, has agreed to add 400 Neos to their fleet in NCR. In light of the severely toxic pollution levels, the move is viewed as a small, yet positive, move towards reducing carbon emissions in the country’s capital.

Jayem Automotives

Tata Motors announced its 50:50 joint venture with Jayem Automotives earlier this year. Jayem Automotives is a Coimbatore-based automotive company which specialises in design and development of automotive components, systems, and prototypes for special-performance, future-tech based vehicles. The company has worked with several leading automakers like Ford, Jaguar, Land Rover, Harley Davidson, and Volvo Motors. It has been involved in Research and Development for more than 20 years. The JV is intended to fuel Tata Motor’s technical prowess in electric vehicles, which is a potential market to capitalise in the coming years.

Jayem Neo: The green and clean electric cab

Jayem’s facility in Coimbatore will roll out the Jayem Neo, which will be exclusively marketed and operated as a taxi. Tata Motors will provide the exterior body-shell (same as Tata Nano), while the electric powertrain system, which includes all components that generate and deliver power in a vehicle, will be supplied by Electra EV, a firm that specialises in designing and developing powertrains, battery packs, and charging infrastructure.

Jayem Neo will be equipped with a 48-volt electric system that can generate 17 kilowatts of power and which will weigh approximately 800 kilograms. These are powerful specifications that make the model suitable as an urban taxi. Neo is expected to perform better than Mahindra’s e2o, the only other competitor in this segment. The compact car will be able to cover 200 kilometres when fully charged, a capacity that can drop to around 140 kilometres, when fully occupied and air-conditioned.

Why was Nano rebranded as Jayem Neo?

Tata Motors is actively working on the electric vehicle segment after the Modi government announced their ambitious plan to shift completely to electric vehicles by 2030. The company has already designed electric versions of most of its models, including the successful Tiago and Tigor models, which have played a key role in turning the company’s fortunes since their launch.

In the case of Nano, sales have declined consistently with just 872 units being sold this year. Even under such grave situations, Tata Motors have expressed their desire to rebrand the famous Tata Nano model. This is a model that was, at a point in time, the cheapest car in the world. The electric vehicle segment has given the company a chance to reposition the model, and it seems likely that Tata Motors will take it. The Jayem Neo may be the testing stage for the latest Nano concept, and by using the Jayem Neo tag in the fleet market initially, Tata Motors may be able to preserve the ‘Nano’ tag for the bigger passenger market, which is far more promising for the giant automaker. This risk-averse attitude for the ‘Nano’ tag seems necessary after several incidents had damaged it severely.

Will Delhi really benefit?

Ola’s initiatives in response to the recent extremities in Delhi’s atmosphere are surely worth recognising, as reducing carbon emissions in Delhi has become a need of the hour and adding electric vehicles to their fleet will directly address the issue.

However, as per 2016 edition of the Delhi statistical handbook, there are a total of 29,86,579 cars and 91,073 taxis in the region. As such, an addition of 400 electric vehicles will have a positive, albeit insignificant, impact on curbing pollution levels in the long term unless similar initiatives are implemented on a larger scale.


Featured Image Credits: Wikimedia Commons