Ola Källenius, Chairman of the Board of Management, Mercedes-Benz Group AG India will play an important role in Mercedes-Benz Group AG’s global business as the company would source more technology and components from India for it’s global operations before exporting vehicles from the country, Ola Kallenius, Mercedes-Benz’s Group AG Chairman of the Board of Management, said in a select interaction.“We are building strong tech and supply relationships in India, not just for India, also for the rest of the world. So we can, export out of India on a component basis before a full vehicle,” he said. “And these tech partnerships and supply partnerships are going from strength to strength.

And the fact that we have the biggest R&D center outside of Germany here in Bengaluru, we also have a very competent production setup since more than 30 years,” he stated. “We have all the ingredients. So this is not a one dimensional play.

India in the Mercedes world is a 360 degree play,” he emphasised. Asked when the company would export vehicles from India, he said, “I am an India believer and certainly an India optimist.

I think that is more a question of when as opposed to a question of if.”“But I want to make clear we have not made such a decision at this point in time,” he said, adding the company would wait for volumes to grow in India before embarking on exports. “So, the first step on the further journey is what organic growth can we have from this point forward. We believe, based upon projections around GDP growth, what we think that the market in India can be in the next five, six, seven years, that we can significantly grow from that number upwards,” he added.

He said R& D in India will play a bigger role and the company would build stronger supply relationships to source components. The company sees energy transition as a reality and being the inventor of automobiles and as an incumbent, it is strengthening it’s capabilities in newer fuels. “The automotive industry is in transition.

It’s in transformation, I would say disruption. What’s driving the disruption is the road to zero emissions and we don’t have to discuss the destination.

The destination is zero emission. It’s just a question of how long it takes,” he said. “We are reinventing the original invention.

So there’s always turbulence when you go through a transformation of that magnitude,” he said adding many new entrants will come in and they of course will go for electric mobility, but the legacy players too will be in the race to succeed. “If you’re an incumbent, you don’t cut off the leg that you stand on right now and you build a new one. So you have to manage a transition that it’s not like with smartphones,” he stated. “The destination is zero emission, that’s where we are going,” he emphasised.

Stating that the company has taken diesel to EU7 standards, he said diesel engines will stay in the portfolio for the foreseeable future. The company on Wednesday announced a fresh investment of ₹200 crore in India, taking the total investment to ₹3,200 crore and introduced its electric GLC SUV at a starting price of ₹78.5 lakh.

The SUV has 711 kms range in one charge and 300 kms of energy can be charged in 10 minutes. Over 1,000 bookings had been received even before the announcement of price, indicating the demand for EVs in India, the company said.

Published - November 04, 2026 09:19 pm IST