JSW Greentech, a subsidiary of Indian conglomerate JSW Group, has announced its entry into the electric commercial vehicle segment with a new brand called Ampstar. It plans to launch a wide range of locally developed and manufactured buses and trucks under the new brand.

The company has set up a greenfield EV manufacturing facility spanning 90 acres in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Maharashtra. It has installed an annual production capacity of 15,000 EVs, including 10,000 buses and 5,000 trucks, although it can flexibly allocate the volume between buses and trucks. The company will begin expanding once it has utilised 50 to 70 per cent of the capacity, and it could easily bring annual capacity to 25,000 vehicles within the existing plant.

JSW Greentech has invested 25 billion rupees (~€229 million euros) in its electric commercial vehicle business and allocated a significant share to in-house development. It says it has developed the vehicle platform; the vehicle control unit (VCU); a four-in-one unit integrating the power distribution unit, DC-DC converter, steering pump inverter drive and air compressor inverter drive; and the base logic, software and algorithms for the entire electric drivetrain.

CEO Sumit Mittal said at the brand launch on 22 September that JSW Greentech is targeting a localisation of 50 per cent for the electric trucks within six months and then around 75 per cent within nine to twelve months, similar to that of electric buses. Parth Jindal, the Managing Director of JSW Cement and JSW Paints, said at the event that the electric commercial vehicle subsidiary will participate in government tenders for the buses and initially focus on B2B contracts for trucks.

Source link