Tesla fails in India, receiving only about 600 orders since launch - Bloomberg

Tesla's long-awaited entry into the Indian market has so far yielded disappointing results, with a small number of orders raising new doubts about the company's global growth prospects. This is reported by UNN with reference to Bloomberg.

Details

According to people familiar with the matter, the electric car manufacturer led by Elon Musk has received orders for just over 600 cars since sales began in mid-July, which was less than the company itself expected. This is roughly the number of cars Tesla supplied every four hours worldwide during the first half of the year.

Tesla now plans to ship 350 to 500 cars to India this year, with the first batch expected to arrive from Shanghai in early September, sources said.

According to them, deliveries will initially be limited to the cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Pune, and Gurgaon. The size of the batch is based on full payments received for the cars, as well as Tesla's ability to deliver outside the four cities where it currently has a physical presence.

The company initially aimed to use its full annual quota of 2,500 cars this year, Bloomberg News previously reported.

While the company was betting on the strength of its brand and its CEO's once-friendly ties with Donald Trump to break into the Indian EV sector, Musk's public conflict with the US president, deteriorating bilateral ties, high local import taxes, and the harsh reality of a price-sensitive market have unraveled that equation. Tesla did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.

Due to high import tariffs, the base model Tesla in India costs over 6 million rupees (68 thousand US dollars), which is significantly higher than the 2.2 million rupees mark where most EV sales occur, according to JATO Dynamics, an automotive analytics company. This effectively puts the base Model Y variant out of reach for the vast majority of Indian consumers in a market where EVs still account for just over 5% of total car sales.

Trump's car tariffs cost Mercedes $420 million - Media01.09.25, 12:51 • 5617 views

The lukewarm reception in India underscores the difficulties Tesla faces as it seeks new growth markets, as challenges mount in China and the US—its two largest markets. Sales fell 13% in the last quarter, and the company is under pressure to avoid a second consecutive year of decline.

Tesla was betting that India's import tariffs, which rise to 110%, would eventually be lowered in trade negotiations with the US. But that looks increasingly unlikely after Trump imposed 50% tariffs on Indian exports, punishing the country for buying Russian oil.

Even a free trade agreement between India and Europe, which provides for preferential duties and would allow Tesla to import cheaper goods from its factory in Germany, has not yet been concluded.

Certainly, Tesla's order numbers are respectable, given the size of the niche market for high-end electric vehicles in India. According to JATO, just over 2,800 electric vehicles costing between 4.5 and 7 million rupees were sold in the first half of 2025.

While Tesla attracts crowds to its glass showrooms, foot traffic has not translated into sales on the scale Tesla envisioned, they said. The company generally avoids aggressive marketing worldwide, relying on a brand that was once synonymous with electric vehicles. But this further sets it back in the local market, where automakers tend to bombard consumers with advertising.

Nevertheless, the automaker is still cautiously expanding in India, installing superchargers in Mumbai and Delhi and planning a third experience center in a southern Indian city as part of its 2026 growth plans, sources said.

Meanwhile, Chinese competitor BYD Co., now the world's leading EV seller, has managed to gain a foothold in India. In the first half of the year, it sold over 1,200 of its Sealion 7 SUVs at an initial price of about 4.9 million rupees, according to JATO, despite similarly high tariffs.

Addition

The most expensive Tesla Cybertruck pickup, known as the Cyberbeast, is now $15,000 more expensive. The change happened overnight, and the company did not advertise the price increase anywhere.