Venture debt firm Stride Ventures is looking to invest ₹100 crores into electric vehicle (EV) start-ups over the next three to six months. The investment firm will focus on OEMs and ancillaries having commercialised use cases within the EV space.

Stride Ventures will also invest into new battery manufacturing and recycling start-ups. The cheque sizes for this working capital debt funding will be of around ₹10-30 crores.

Apart from this fund, it has already invested another ₹40 crores into e-mobility start-up Blu Smart and battery manufacturing start-up Lohum.

“EV space is evolving and there are tailwinds from the government as well. Being a venture debt firm, we come in once the start-up begin to generate some revenue and the proof of concept is done. There’s no technology risk at this stage. We have invested in a couple of companies and plan to invest in more. We have term sheets out. We are planning to add another ₹100 crores over the next three to six months. We are quite excited about this space,” Abhinav Suri, Managing Partner, Stride Ventures told BusinessLine.

Multiple business models

He added, “We are looking at multiple business models evolving here. There is battery manufacturing, battery recycling, companies solving for range anxieties such as battery swapping, long range batteries, and pureplay mobility start-ups working on EVs for commercial use cases. Using EVs for commercial use cases is what is getting us excited. Whether it is cabs, 3-wheelers and 2-wheelers for deliveries, this is our focus.

Suri remains unperturbed by the big brands entering and expanding in this space including Ola, Tesla and other mainstream automobile companies. He believes that it is the B2B side where a lot of work has already happened, away from the limelight and marketing of consumer facing brands.

“There’s a lot of work happening on the commercial side and battery side which are B2B in nature, those companies have been working for some time now and their technologies have stabilised. Ola comes to your mind because they spend a lot on marketing and it’s a consumer brand. Real adoption is going to come from commercialised 2-wheeler space, which will give maximum benefit to the environment and consumers,” he said.

Concerns fading

He adds that the two big concerns on the consumer side around resale value of EVs and range anxieties on where to charge batteries is already fading and the adoption will fast pickup over the next two years. For commercial use cases, most delivery companies like Amazon, Flipkart and logistics companies are currently transitioning to using EVs.

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