[Venkatesh]

MG India leadership has done a ask me anything session regarding Battery as a Service option.



Few Insights :

- First up. The battery rental of Rs 3.5/km is backed by a finance company and you pay it like you would an EMI. And that means you can finance the battery only and pay for the car upfront. Or vice versa.

- Big finance companies are not yet on board with the battery as a service scheme as, MG's Gauran Gupta says, it was the smaller companies that were open to this new idea.

- On transferring the scheme to a new owner, Rajeev Chaba says that the company is working on a sliding scale model by which a new owner could get the benefits and carry on with the rental.

- On the direct buy option. That will be available and prices for the car on outright purchase will be announced in about a week.

- If you stop paying EMIs for the battery, the car will be re-possesed and you will get back the money you have paid for the car already, minus depreciation.

Link

[SakJel]

Hello,

I hope the direct buy price starts at 12.99L. Then only they can expect some decent numbers and will make sense.

This whole idea of leasing is only flawed hence big finance companies are not on board.

They have understood that it was a botched up launch hence now the cover up has started like direct buy option, sliding option for the 2nd buyer etc etc. Let's hope to get a clarity in a few days as it's a nice product with an absolute rubbish launch in the history of launches.

Cheers.....

[santosh.s]

Putting aside BaaS mess and unusual 2-step front look, it has turned out to be quite a competitive offering. However, I am disappointed due to the fact that they have chosen to skip some features like ADAS, powered tail gate, bigger battery. They should have offered them at least with higher variants. Expectations were high after coming to know that this car comes with auto parking feature in China. While a part of ADAS suite like adaptive cruise control and lane keep related functions are suitable only for highways, others are useful anywhere.

A few points that I noticed in comparison to Curvv sound ridiculous. Curvv has reduced parking sensors to 2 each in front at rear, whereas Windosor has 4 sensors in the back alone, no front sensors. Rear AC vent is single, I don't know what kind of "business class" comfort they wanted to offer with that. May be it is restricted to only one person, others will be treated like cattle class . Curvv at least has 2 vents, though they felt flimsy and probably won't last long without issues. Rear wiper is missing in both. I had heard of sun roof screen not being thick enough for Indian summers in Astor/ZS EV, hope they correct it in this car.

[SakJel]

Originally Posted by Venkatesh

Few Insights :

- First up. The battery rental of Rs 3.5/km is backed by a finance company and you pay it like you would an EMI. And that means you can finance the battery only and pay for the car upfront. Or vice versa.

I have a question here, they say that only the battery can be financed and pay for the car upfront or vice a versa, that means a person has to shell out 10L minimum from one's pocket for the car get finance for the battery or vice a versa and x amount for the battery and get finance on car. That's absurd.

Secondly if the government of India allows double hypothecation say a person shells down 2L as down-payment and gets 8L finance on car and x amount finance on battery, and for some reason he becomes the defaulter, then it will be repossessed by which financer, the car/battery financer and how much more the person has to pay after depreciation. Please enlighten.

[sri_tesla]

Originally Posted by Venkatesh

Big finance companies are not yet on board with the battery as a service scheme as, MG's Gauran Gupta says, it was the smaller companies that were open to this new idea.

On the direct buy option. That will be available and prices for the car on outright purchase will be announced in about a week.

Finance companies themselves must have been confused with the scheme. First, they launched the vehicle with only Baas, which has many terms and conditions. Now, they are holding a session to clear up the confusion. At least they realized the blunder and now announcing a direct buy option.

[ottocycle]

Direct buy option is a welcome move and a course correction for them. Hope they announce the real ex-showroom prices soon so that we can go back and focus on discussing the car rather than baas confusions.

They also need to launch the 50kwh version. I think they are holding that because it will start affecting ZS EV sales.

[narayans80]

Originally Posted by Venkatesh

MG India leadership has done a ask me anything session regarding Battery as a Service option.

One answer not quoted is.

There are different payback periods depending on scheme chosen.

This means its not perpetual. Another question asked, but no clear answer is about the > 1500 km usage.

[JunkyardHunter]

Originally Posted by SakJel

Hello,

I hope the direct buy price starts at 12.99L. Then only they can expect some decent numbers and will make sense.

Highly doubt that decent numbers will arrive. All this BaaS nonsense will overshadow the actual full buyout price for the Windsor, even if it’s at good value.

[krishnakumar]

Subscription models like this have struggled to work in India and this was a very bad move. There are a lot of examples for these.

They should have launched an outright buying option to get a lot of footfall and then introduced the BaaS concept once the car is on the buyer’s consideration list (assuming my this BaaS model works in their favor). Wonder who is making these calls as it seems pretty obvious.

On the car itself, I hate it. Simply because there are no freaking buttons. Some car manufacturers have realized the mistake and are now going back to buttons for essential driver related functions but then you have the likes of these cars still thinking it’s cool to adjust the mirror using the ICE screen (one among the many basic things done via the screen in Windsor, another example being headlight levelling). How do we get this point across to these stupid car designers?

I often adjust my mirrors while parking the car to position it accurately as I’m a stickler for perfect parking. This car would drive me nuts having to do this through a screen.

ARAI should mandate physical buttons for basic driver control functions for a car to be deemed roadworthy.

The manufacturer probably saves a lot of money by skimping out on these buttons. Agree, something like a headlight leveller is only ever needed once in a while, but when needed, it is a critical function and should not require a driver to fiddle around in a screen. This is dangerous!

[Contrapunto]

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/.../113346020.cms

This also explains that the "whole car" cost will be forthcoming. Good to see MG management listening to customer chatter and responding in an agile way. As I said, this looks like an EXCELLENT product. The sooner they start communicting the inherent value of the product and remove "distractions", the better it is for everyone.

[veedub89]

BaaS is a needlessly complicated model.

If you are going to price the car real cheap then just bundle in the battery cost as well. At this stage of EV adoption, buying an EV should be the same experience as buying an ICE car.

MG has gone and shot itself in the foot by these hare-brained strategies. They wanted to go for an extremely eye-watering initial cost of the car so they got this scheme in. What they should perhaps realise is that at some 13.xx lakhs the Windsor would have seemed similarly attractive than at 9.99 lakhs + some-battery-scheme-you-pay-extra-for.

[Venkatesh]

Windsor EV media drive reviews drops on Sep 21 at 2pm.

























Source : CarandBike

[shyampsunder]

Originally Posted by Comrade

If anyone is looking for a chauffer-driven car for city use, then Windsor should be high on the list. It can also do intercity drives to nearby towns (200-250 km roundtrip) without a charge. It can't be a frequent highway car but if MG decides to offer 50 kwh battery in the future, it can be as good highway car (range-wise) as Currv, ZS and Atto3 base variant.

Excellent summary, differ only on the highway aspect of the car.

This will be a pretty solid car for one way trips on highways upto 350 KMs on routes with good charging infra.

From Bangalore, there are many such popular destinations like Chennai, Coimbatore, Coorg etc.

Stop for a meal, top up to 80% in 30 mins and you are sorted.

50 kWh variant will unlock distances of upto 450 KMs.

[GoBabyGo]

Based on my assumptions, I anticipate MG will announce Windsor EV with a battery ex showroom price of Rs. 13.99 lakhs for the Excite variant.

[subho10]

If this kind of model proliferates, RTOs around the country stand to lose huge amount in taxes.

Car companies will just sell bare shells and those will get registered in RTO.
Based on the usages model either ICE or EV car can charge a subscription fee or usage fee and call it as Engine as a Service ( EaaS).