Elon Musk-owned Tesla has signed a five-year lease for a 4,003 square feet showroom in the Maker Maxity building, on the ground floor of 2 North Avenue, at Mumbai’s Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC), for Rs 23.38 crore, according to registration documents provided by Propstack, a real estate data analytics firm.
The company will pay a rental of Rs 35.26 lakh per month, which is calculated at the rate Rs 888 per square foot, per month. The company has paid a security deposit of Rs 2.11 crore. The tenure of the lease agreement is five years, starting February 16, 2025, and the rent will increase by 5 per cent every year.
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Tesla plans to open its second showroom in Delhi’s Aerocity.
Tesla’s first car for the Indian market could be a relatively affordable model priced close to Rs 22,00,000 (nearly USD 25,000). Since the company has no immediate plans to start manufacturing electric cars in India, they could be imported from its gigafactory at Berlin-Brandenburg in Germany.
The company’s initial plan is to bring an electric vehicle to India for less than USD 25,000. The price of Tesla cars in the US starts at USD 35,000 (which is approximately Rs 30.4 lakh) at the factory level. The Tesla Model 3 is the company’s cheapest car in the US.
Though Tesla hasn’t committed to manufacturing in India, the company is likely to source more than a billion dollars worth of components from India and this figure is expected to rise significantly in the coming months.
India currently imposes import duties of up to 110% on vehicles, which Tesla CEO Elon Musk has publicly criticised as amongst the highest globally. This had led to Tesla previously abandoning its plans to enter India’s market, which ranks as the world’s third-largest for automobiles.
India’s automotive tariff policy is likely to be addressed in forthcoming trade negotiations and this is widely expected to benefit Tesla, which is preparing to enter the Indian market.
