Ola Electric Q4: Loss More Than Doubles YoY To INR 870 Cr

EV maker Ola Electric’s consolidated net loss skyrocketed 109% to INR 870 Cr in Q4 FY25 from INR 416 Cr in the year-ago quarter. On a quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) basis, the company’s loss increased 54% from INR 564 Cr. 

The hefty loss for the EV maker came on the back of a sharp decline in its top line and a one-time warranty provision of INR 250 Cr. The company’s operating revenue crashed 62% to INR 611 Cr from INR 1,598 Cr in the same quarter last year. Sequentially, this marked a 42% decline from INR 1,045 Cr.

In a post-earnings call, Ola Electric cofounder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal said that the company increased its warranty provision by INR 250 Cr in Q4 for its Gen 1 and Gen 2 scooters sold till date.

“… we are revising our per-unit warranty provisioning upwards basis internal assessments to reflect a more conservative and forward-looking approach. These steps, combined with phase out of the Gen 1 platform from warranty period, increasing Gen 3 platform in the mix, and steps taken to rationalize warranty claims will enable us to lower our warranty expenses,” the company said in its shareholders’ letter.

Including other income of INR 117 Cr, total revenue for the quarter stood at INR 728 Cr, down 56% YoY. Expenses shrunk 32% YoY and 13% QoQ to INR 1,306 Cr in the quarter.

For the full fiscal year FY25, the company’s loss surged 44% to INR 2,276 Cr from INR 1,584 Cr in FY24. Meanwhile, its top line shrunk 10% YoY to INR 4,514 Cr.

Behind Ola Electric’s Grim Q4 

The reason behind the sharp decline in Ola Electric’s Q4 revenue was the fall in its sales. The EV maker, which retained its top position in the electric two-wheeler (E2W) market in India in FY25, saw a 56% YoY decline in deliveries to 51,375 units in Q4 FY25. 

 

The company said that it lost its market share in FY25 and faced “execution challenges” as it attempted to aggressively scale up its sales and service operations.

Ola Electric said that the pace of EV penetration in India during the fiscal year slowed down significantly. Citing Vahan data, it showed that the overall E2W registrations in the fiscal year grew only about 18% as against 33% growth in FY24. 

“We have seen increased competitive intensity from traditional OEMs across all levers including distribution, product expansion and discounting. This, combined with operational challenges in scaling up our D2C sales and service network and slower pace of EV penetration growth in FY25 resulted in quarter-on-quarter loss of market share,” the company said. 

To note, the quarter saw Ola Electric face a controversy regarding its monthly sales figures for February. The discrepancies between reported sales and actual vehicle registrations brought the company under the lens of the heavy industries ministry. 

The company’s registrations on the Vahan portal were disrupted during the quarter as it was renegotiating the terms of agreements with its registration agencies and then moved the process in-house.

“We internalised the vehicle registration process, bringing it in-house and phasing out reliance on third-party agents. This change caused a temporary registration backlog in Feb ’25 but has since been resolved,” the company said. 

The quarter was also rife with other business-related issues. A major controversy was the company operating some of its retail stores without the necessary trade certificate, which led to closures of several stores across states. While Ola Electric refrained from commenting on these developments during the quarter, it didn’t directly address this issue in its shareholders’ letter as well.

The company said it operates a network of D2C sales and service networks of over 4,0000 across the country. After the aggressive expansion of its network under ‘Project Vistaar’, it is now looking to improve its footprint by giving a deeper training to its front-line teams, enhanced governance and IT systems, and increasing availability of test ride vehicles and vehicle inventory at its stores.

Roadster Key Part Of Ola Electric’s FY26 Roadmap

In the post-earnings call, Aggarwal acknowledged the tough March quarter that the company faced due to regulatory issues, mounting competition in the EV space and decline in sales.

However, despite the rise in loss, Ola Electric is focusing on turning its auto segment EBITDA profitable in FY26.

“The company’s strategy and the company’s fundamentals remain very strong. Our strategy of focusing on vertical integration remains consistent and we very strongly believe this is the winning strategy given that, globally, the only companies who make money (Tesla and BYD) follow this,” the CEO said. 

In its bid to turn the auto segment EBITDA positive, Ola Electric will focus more on its ebikes. While the company entered the segment after a lot of delays last week, Aggarwal said that the roll out of the mass market variant of Roadster X received positive response from its customer base. 

The company plans to begin the deliveries of two more models under the Roadster series in the near future. As a result, it will also make some changes in its product plans.

In the shareholders’ letter, the EV maker said that it will delay the S1 Z, Gig/Gig+ and some other future products to “sequentially launch these products such that each product receives the right customer mindshare”. 

In the call, Aggarwal also said that the company will put on hold its plans to launch electric three-wheelers for now. 

The CEO said that the company’s Gen 3 platform is driving a majority of its sales volumes and helped it keep its auto gross margin flat at 19.2% in Q4. 

With the financial viability of its Gen 3 platform, Ola Electric expects to see lucrative gains in its bottom line from the sales of ebikes in the coming quarters. The company believes that it can achieve auto segment EBITDA breakeven with sales of less than 25K units per month. 

“A lot of our advantage of vertical integration is starting to play out in our gross margin already from Q1 onwards and hence we expect to get to the auto segment  EBITDA positive within some time in Q1. We are more or less on track on that, maybe June-July sometime… we will have our auto segment EBITDA positive,” Aggarwal asserted. 

Cell Manufacturing Picks Up 

Amid the otherwise grim quarter, the EV maker said it has made progress in its EV cell manufacturing capabilities. The company is ramping up production at the Ola Gigafactory with “improving yields of its Bharat Cell which is undergoing extensive testing across performance, lifecycle, and safety parameters, with phased commercialisation in a couple of months”. 

“This phased rollout will help optimise supply chain dynamics, maintain quality consistency across early production batches, and gather real-world performance feedback ahead of mass commercialisation,” the company said.

It has begun production of its in-house 4680-format Bharat Cell, which are currently under the testing phase. 

In FY25, the company made an investment of $100 Mn to initiate ‘phase 1A’ of the Gigafactory with 1.5 GWh of cell manufacturing capacity. The factory was initially expected to reach a 5 GWh output capacity by October 2024 and subsequently expand to 20 GWh. However, it is yet to achieve the 5 GWh capacity.  

Aggarwal said that the company will achieve 5 GWh capacity by early FY27 now. On the delays, he said that Ola Electric is being very methodical and calibrated in its cell project. 

“We want to make sure the first phase which we have done is 1.5 GWh and then expand to 5 GWh. This is India’s first Gigafactory,” he added.

To bolster the Gigafactory, Ola Electric has earmarked a total capex of INR 1,600 Cr, out of which INR 1,100 Cr will be debt financing and the remainder would be equity financing. To note, the company’s board recently approved a proposal to raise up to INR 1,700 Cr via debt financing. 

However, Ola Electric expects its overall capex to be under INR 200 Cr in FY26 as against INR 411 Cr in FY25.

“… the bulk of our capex cycle is behind us, as with manufacturing & distribution infrastructure in place and shared across both scooters & motorcycles, no significant additional capex is required in the near to mid term,” the company said.

Shares of Ola Electric ended today’s trading session 0.60% higher at INR 53.24 on the BSE.