In the same period, legacy players have doubled their sales. Hosur-headquartered TVS Motor led the electric two-wheeler segment in Q1 with 68,682 units sold, followed by Pune-headquartered Bajaj Auto Ltd, which recorded 62,629 unit sales, data from Vahan portal showed. Ola’s startup rival Ather Energy, which listed on the bourses this May, also more than doubled its sales y-o-y in Q1 to nearly 40,000 electric scooters.
Overall, the electric two-wheeler market grew 31% y-o-y in the first quarter to 291,294 units. TVS held 24% market share, Bajaj 22%, while Ola Electric held 20% market share. Ather’s market share was at 14% during the first three months of the fiscal.
To be sure, at the end of the previous fiscal (FY25), Ola’s market share was at 30%, TVS at 21%, Bajaj Auto’s at 20% and Ather’s share at 11%.
Experts indicate that the surge of legacy players is expected to continue as they utilise their distribution network and experience in the auto market.
“We believe the surge from TVS and Bajaj will not only sustain but potentially accelerate, aided by the ramp-up of Hero MotoCorp’s EV rollout,” said Shridhar Kallani, research analyst for auto at Axis Securities. “As Hero scales its portfolio, we anticipate a three-horse race at the top, with legacy players expected to capture 60-65% of India’s E2W market share by FY27. We believe the age of tech-first, product-later is over.”
Hero MotoCorp is eyeing 25,000-30,000 monthly sales in the electric two-wheeler space in the next two years, with launches of two new variants of its flagship Vida electric scooter in the current financial year. In FY25, its average monthly sales were around 4,000 units.
During its last earnings call on 29 May, Ola Electric had guided for 65,000 sales of scooters and bikes and ₹800-850 crore in revenue. As the Vahan portal doesn’t capture Telangana data, a company spokesperson told Mint that Ola is on track to achieve its stated guidance.
“Please note that we are on track with Q1 guidance regarding vehicle deliveries and revenue,” said the spokesperson in an emailed reply when asked if the company will achieve its Q1 guidance.
In February, the company said that it faced disruptions in registering vehicles due to renegotiations with its registrations agencies. It has moved the entire registration process in house and the backlog of registrations in February and March also spilled over to the first quarter of the current financial year. During its last earnings call, the company informed that the registration issues were resolved in the current quarter.
To take on legacy players’ on-ground infrastructure, Ola increased its sales network from 800 to over 4,000 stores in the past one year, as part of its Project Vistaar. However, the company’s market share has fallen despite the expansion and the launch of deliveries of its electric motorcycle RoadsterX (in May 2024) and Gen3 platform scooters (in January 2025).
Aggarwal, Ola Electric’s chairman and managing director, had told analysts and investors during the last earnings call that the company would soon start gaining market share as its network productivity and sales productivity improve.
“In the last quarter or two, we have lost market share as market penetration grew slower than we expected and competitive intensity increased significantly across all levers of distribution, product and pricing,” Aggarwal told analysts. “But industry is today at a state where roughly the top three players are equal, give or take here and there a little bit. And now I believe the scooter EV industry is going to enter a phase where genuine product and innovation will start winning as well as balancing profitability and growth.”
Financial performance, too, has been hit, with the company’s net loss widening to ₹2,276 crore in FY25 from ₹1,584 crore in FY24, even as its revenue fell to ₹4,514 crore from ₹5,010 crore.
The fall in sales has also resulted in downgrading of debt of Ola Electric Technologies Private Ltd, a key subsidiary through which Ola Electric sells its scooters. Rating agency Icra downgraded its debt worth ₹1,887 crore.
“The downgrade of ratings and continuation of the Negative outlook are due to slower-than-expected scale-up in OET’s electric two-wheeler (e2W) sales volumes, which has resulted in a longer-than-expected period of cash burn and has elongated the road to the company’s profitability,” Icra said in a note dated 1 May.
The continuous fall in sales has also worried investors, with Ola’s scrip on the NSE falling nearly 50% in 2025 compared to a 3% rise in the Nifty Auto index.
On Monday, Ola’s share price on the NSE rose 0.05% to ₹43.11. The scrip achieved its peak value of ₹146 on 19 August 2024.
Source:https://www.livemint.com/companies/company-results/ola-electric-q1-sales-halve-tvs-bajaj-edge-ahead-in-two-wheeler-ev-race-11751285237419.html