Macquarie Group's Macquarie Asset Management has launched Vertelo, a new platform for end-to-end fleet electrification in India and also announced an investment of $1.5 billion over the next 10 years.
"The transition to EVs will bring significant benefits to India, increasing its energy independence and mitigating the impacts of climate change. Vertelo aims to play a key role in accelerating this transition by making it easy for its customers to realise the benefits of going electric immediately," said Abhishek Poddar, India country head, Macquarie Group.
Vertelo has signed a long-term lease agreement with Tata Motors to buy up to 2000 electric cars over the next 3 years, Chalo Mobility to supply 44 electric buses manufactured by JBM, and also Eka Mobility to buy 2000 electric buses in the next 3-5 years.
"We own and operate companies across funds globally. In India, we want to develop an integrated fleet electrification solution provider. We aim to transform India's EV ecosystem by driving large scale adoption of electric vehicles," Sandeep Gambhir, CEO, Vertelo.
He adds that the new company's name comes from a combination of convert and velocity which is to accelerate the transition to being electric. Vert also means green in French and bringing in green in our name was very important to us, he says.
"There are challenges like high upfront costs, obsolescence risk of the battery, limited availability of capital, lack of charging infrastructure, etc. That's where we come with a solution to make it viable for them to run electric fleets," he adds.
The company aims to provide end-to-end solutions like fleet management services, charging infrastructure and energy solutions, leasing and financing solutions and end of vehicle life management.