Tata Motors is set to source battery packs for its passenger electric vehicles (EVs) from China’s Octillion Power Systems. This marks a departure from its previous sole supplier, Tata AutoComp Systems.

What Happened: The latest Curvv coupe sports utility vehicle from Tata Motors will be powered by lithium-ion battery packs from Octillion, according to a Mint report. The California-headquartered company, with operations in the US and India, is the first external battery supplier for Tata Motors since the launch of its flagship Nexon EV in 2020.

Octillion, which installed a 2-gigawatt-hour battery pack capacity in Pune last year, will provide battery packs for the 45-kilowatt-hour variant of the Curvv EV. The larger 55-kilowatt hour variant will continue to use battery packs from Tata AutoComp, featuring 105 ampere-hour prismatic cells supplied by Gotion.

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The decision comes at a time when Tata Motors is grappling with a challenging electric vehicle market. The company is looking to address performance issues, such as state-of-charge drop observed in some previous models, by incorporating new battery pack designs and cell types.

This move is expected to diversify the supply and technology base of India’s largest EV maker as it ventures into new categories in the sector.

“Adopting such a multi-sourcing strategy hedges supply chain risks, mitigates dependency on a single supplier and improves competitiveness for timely and seamless supply of required parts.” a spokesperson from Tata Motors told Mint.

Price Action: Tata Motors’ shares were down 0.38% to ₹1,073.15 on Wednesday.

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