Ola partners with Siemens to build EV manufacturing facility

ANI Technologies-run cab aggregator Ola on Monday said it has partnered with German automation company Siemens to set up its electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing plant in Tamil Nadu. 

The Bengaluru-based startup, as per a statement, will have access to Siemens’ integrated Digital Twin design and manufacturing solutions to help it digitalise and validate product and production capabilities. 

Ola’s factory, to be built on Siemens’ Industry 4.0 principles, will have nearly 5,000 robots deployed across various functions.

The company in December signed an MoU with the Tamil Nadu government to invest nearly Rs 2,400 crore to set up the facility.

“Siemens is a global leader in Industry 4.0 and we are proud to contribute to Ola’s vision of creating a factory of the future using our automation and digitalization expertise to ensuring the highest levels of productivity and quality while enabling an agile and flexible production process,” Sunil Mathur, managing director and CEO of Siemens India, said.

The factory will be AI-powered with Ola’s in-house AI engine and tech stack integrated into every aspect of the manufacturing process. This will provide control, automation and quality to the entire operations, especially with Ola’s implementation of cyber-physical and advanced IoE systems, the statement said.

The raw material handling at the factory will be fully automated -- right from movement within the facility, storage, to rolling off finished scooters and loading into trucks -- for maximum efficiency, it said.

For Ola, this will be a global manufacturing plant, supplying to markets across Europe, the UK, America and the ANZ region.

‘This will be our global hub and will set a benchmark in quality, scale and efficiency, demonstrating India’s capability to build world class cutting edge products. We look forward to bringing this factory online in the coming months and putting our products in the hands of customers,” Bhavish Aggarwal, chairman and group CEO of Ola, said.

Touted as the largest scooter manufacturing hub, the factory will have an initial capacity of building 2 million units of scooters every year and generate around 10,000 jobs, the statement said. 

The scooter’s design, the statement said, has already won design and innovation awards, including the IHS Markit Innovation award at CES and the German Design Award.