Arvind Mathew to quit as Mahindra Reva CEO

Arvind Mathew, CEO of home-grown carmaker Mahindra & Mahindra’s electric vehicle arm Mahindra Reva, is set to step down from the top position. This information has been revealed by Autocar India, Autocar Professional’s sister magazine. 

Mathew will be replaced by Mahesh Babu, who has been serving as the chief operating officer of Mahindra Reva since January 2015. Babu was instrumental in developing the XUV500 and was its project head.

Autocar Professional learns that the transition may "take a couple of months". Mathew may take on a new role within the Mahindra Group. 

Mathew had taken over from Reva founder Chetan Maini on May 1, 2015, who resigned from his post as the head of the electric car company. Currently, Maini has almost no active role in the company. In fact, he is more of an advisor to Anand Mahindra, chairman of the Mahindra Group.

A former managing director of Ford India, Mathew came to Mahindra with over two decades of experience with the US carmaker, where he was involved in the development of new vehicle and powertrain program. Before joining Mahindra Reva, he held the position of CEO, Tata Advanced Materials Ltd.
Mahindra Reva, which recently branded itself as Mahindra Electric, is India’s sole electric car company. Sales of electric vehicles grew 37.5 percent to 22,000 units in the fiscal year ended March 2016, up from 16,000 units in 2014-15, according to Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicles (SMEV). Of these, only 2,000 units were four-wheelers.

On June 2, 2016, Mahindra Reva had launched its zero emissions sedan, the e-Verito in key cities like New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Pune, Kolkata, Chandigarh, Hyderabad, Jaipur and Nagpur at Rs 9.50 lakh (ex-showroom, Delhi).

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