GM meets Reva in Indian EV deal
GM has signed a deal with Indian specialist Reva for joint development of a small EV for the Indian marketGM's India division has announced a deal with Indian EV specialist Reva to develop running platforms, drivetrains, vehicle control systems and a mass-market small EV for the Indian domestic market. According to reports GM and Reva will jointly produce a battery-powered vehicle based on GM's light car, the Chevrolet Spark.
Claiming to be the first to commercialise the EV, Bangalore-based Reva has been working on the technology for around 15 years. The company lays claim to the largest roadgoing EV fleet in the world, with more than 3000 units on roads throughout Asia, Europe and Latin America having chalked up around 70 million kilometres over 15 years.
The company is best known internationally for its G-Wiz, an all-electric four-seater tiny and slow enough to qualify not as a car but as a quadracycle in the European market. This has earned it criticism for its exemption from safety regulations in the UK -- Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson, for example, gave it a predictable every-which-way hammering in The Times.
But with India and China home to around a third of the world's population, the burgeoning market for private cars across both their fast-developing economies is causing plenty of anxiety for its potential contribution to global warming. And cars like the G-Wiz are better suited to their crowded metropolitan roads, which make a London peak hour tame by comparison.
The deal is an acknowledgement by the General of the disparate needs of a global market fast fragmenting into a series of niches and the growing imperative of speed to market. The companies have already started on feasibility studies for grafting Reva's existing electric technologies on to GM's existing small car platforms.
"Development of small electric vehicles is a growth area for the automotive industry. We expect cooperation with Reva in India to accelerate GM's progress to meet the emerging needs in many parts of the world," GM's international operations president, Nick Reilly, said in a statement.
Details of the pending joint venture small car will be released 'soon', with production expected begin in 2010.
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