Many countries have a local car manufacturing industry, but Sri Lanka is not known for having one. Around four decades ago, well-known business tycoon Upali Wijewardene pioneered the assembly of FIAT cars (Upali Fiat) in Sri Lanka, some of which are still around. Relatively inexpensive Japanese cars flooded the country after economic liberalization in the late 1970s, which decimated that emerging industry.
Right now, Micro Cars has an assembly unit for certain types of Geely and Ssanyong vehicles, while Mahindra and Mahindra too has an assembly plant in Welipenna to locally manufacture some of its best-selling models which come to Sri Lanka in Completely Knocked Down (CKD) form. In fact, the first units from Mahindra’s venture with Ideal Motors have already been manufactured. Apart from Micro’s namesake car from some years ago, there has been no attempt to build a completely indigenous car for Sri Lanka.
But the future of the car (and of course, transport itself) is electric. The days of the Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) could be over by as early as 2035, as all car makers are shifting to electric power trains. Several all-new electric car models including the Mercedes EQC, Porsche Taycan, Tesla Cybertruck, Audi e-tron and the Electric Mini will invade the global market this year and some of these will come to our shores as well.
It is in this context that we should laud the efforts of a team of young Sri Lankans who have built an all-new electric car from the ground up. Not just any electric car – an electric supercar that can rival almost any supercar, electric or ICE, from an established global manufacturer such as Porsche, Ferrari or Lamborghini. The Vega (meaning “Speed” in Sinhala) EVX had its World premiere last week at the Geneva Motor Show marking a proud moment for Sri Lanka and its enterprising youth. (Note that the exhibition is actually closed to the public due to COVID-19 fears). The Government has extended its fullest support to this venture.
The electric supercar, with a price tag of US$ 250,000 (that compares favourably with most other supercars), will certainly put Sri Lanka on the world auto production map. The specs of the car are truly world class. The production version of the Sri Lankan supercar will be 4.53 m long, 1.99 m wide, 1.22 m tall, and has a 2.85 m wheelbase. It has a luggage capacity of 260 litres (enough for some gold bags) and weighs 2,090 kg, 480 kg of which are due to the battery. The battery pack is composed of 12 modules, each of them with 50 lithium ferrous phosphate (LiFePO4) pouch batteries. Currently, it delivers 540V and 40 kWh, enough for 250 km. Fast charging is available via an appropriate charger. The all-electric supercar can reach a top speed of 240 km/h and a 0 to 100 km/h of 3.1 seconds.
“At the moment, we are putting in a lot of effort on technologies for this battery pack, with tab liquid cooling, advance fusing, and high energy density packing technologies. We hope that our real USP – Unique Selling Proposition – will stand out with the cylindrical cell packs that we are developing,” said a Vega spokesman. “Unlike some other EV supercars, we decided to build all the electronics ourselves in the first go. The liquid motor controller, EVCU, BMS, DC/DC, body control, thermal control, etc. are all built by us from the ground up. That took a long time to get to a drivable state.” This is indeed a stellar effort in that less than 30 engineers were involved in the project at any given time and they lacked the expensive CNC tooling necessary for this kind of work.
But there are many challenges ahead. This car had been hand built, which may not be possible if actual orders are placed for the car in any number. The Vega team must decide how many cars they are going to build – some supercars built by established brands have a very limited production run, like 100 units. In that case, the factory facilities available locally may not suffice to produce both Left Hand Drive (LHD) and Right Hand Drive (RHD) cars and Vega might have to outsource assembly to a specialist company such as the Austria-based Magna Styer which builds cars for other companies. It is likely that there will be more LHD orders than RHD ones, simply because more countries drive on the right.
Another option for Vega is to use this as a foundation to venture into the production of more affordable electric cars, which are also easier to manufacture. This is indeed how Tesla started – with an electric roadster that cost more than US$ 200,000 (there is a new model coming this year that will compete with the Vega) and now Tesla has a Model 3 sedan that costs US$ 35,000 (base excluding options). It all depends on marketing – the Vega should be positioned not only to appeal to the super-rich who have the cash to buy, but also to car lovers who might someday aspire to buy a more affordable Vega-badged electric car or even an electric bike. Vega should aspire to become a brand known to motor enthusiasts all over the world.
Vega – and other established carmakers represented in Sri Lanka – must also resolve the chicken and egg situation that prevails with regard to electric car chargers. Sri Lanka needs to have a network of superchargers with the rising popularity of electric cars, which will be the only ones allowed to be registered after 2040.
One option is to partner with a company such as Tesla, which builds superchargers at its own expense whenever it officially launches cars in a given country. Another option is to popularise solar-powered car chargers that will be completely carbon neutral.
This will stop people tapping into the thermal-energy powered national grid to charge their electric cars, which can negate any perceived benefit of using them.
One more thing: On this International Women’s Day, the authorities must strive to get more girls and women into vocations such as motor mechanism, vehicle building and maintenance and vehicle design.
Very few women are involved even in vehicle sales, which is also seen as a man’s job. There is still a glass ceiling for women in this sector, which must be broken. These subjects could be offered at school and university level to attract more girls to follow such courses.
Gender equality must happen in all sectors and Sri Lanka’s nascent and emerging auto assembly industry could take the lead in this regard.