After years of talks, Elon Musk‘s electric vehicle giant Tesla Inc. has finally made its way to India, setting up an office in the Silicon Valley of India, Bengaluru – the capital of the south Indian state of Karnataka.
There is some ambiguity about what the company will do in India: whether it will set up an R&D office, or a sales office, or a manufacturing plant is unknown.
A regulatory filing showed that a company called Tesla Motors India and Energy Private Limited was incorporated on 8th January, with an office in Lavelle Road in Bengaluru, which is home to several global technology and R&D companies.
“We have been interacting with Tesla for the last few months and it is happy news that they have decided to incorporate their company here. We have impressed upon them that Bengaluru is not only the technology capital but also the aerospace and space capital. For any kind of technology collaboration, it has the right kind of talent pool,” Gaurav Gupta, principal secretary, commerce & industries of Karnataka said.
“How they want to enter and take it forward is left to their judgment. Hopefully, this will lead to sales office, research and further developments as necessary,” he added.
Tesla’s subsidiary has also named three directors – Vaibhav Taneja, Venkatrangam Sreeram, and David Feinstein. While Taneja is the Chief Accounting Officer at Tesla, Feinstein is the Global Senior Director at Tesla. However, not much is known about Venkatrangam Sreeram, who is on the board of two other firms – Xenon Automotive India, an automotive fleet and dealer management firm, and Clearquote Technologies India, an artificial intelligence firm that specialises in vehicle inspections.
The CEO of Tesla, Elon Musk was in news recently for surpassing Amazon’s Jeff Bezos to become the richest man in the world.
Will Tesla’s foray in the Indian market start a new chapter for electric vehicles in India? What do you think? Let us know your views in the comments section below.
