Pod Insights Finshots Daily Ola Electric's comeback? About this episode In today’s episode on 13th April 2026, we talk about Ola Electric’s stock price surge and the factors behind what looks like a comeback.
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Transcript 0:01 Speaker 00 Hello folks, you're tuned into Finchart's Daily. In today's episode, we talk about Ola Electric's stock price surge and the factors behind what looks like a comeback.
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0:58 Speaker 00 The startup hasn't really had a smooth run for most part of the time since its listing. Sure, right after its IPO, things looked great. It held a thirty, thirty-five percent share of electric two-wheeler market and seemed firmly in control. But then twenty twenty-five happened and things started to slip. Service centers got overwhelmed, backlogs piled up to nearly twenty thousand bikes and customers grew frustrated with delays. This led to regulatory scrutiny and bad press coverage and the numbers soon reflected this. In Q3 FI26, deliveries fell to thirty-two thousand six eighty units compared to eighty-four thousand units in the same period last year. Revenue dropped to four seventy crore rupees, nearly half of what it was a year ago. Losses narrowed slightly, but not enough to move the needle.
1:44 Speaker 00 Meanwhile, the stock hit all-time lows in Feb twenty twenty-six, losing about a quarter of its value. Its market share told an even harsher story. From a dominant position, it fell to under six percent just a month ago, pushing Ola down to fifth place behind TBS Motor, Bajaj Auto, Aether Energy and Hero Motocorp. This made analysts, including Goldman Sachs, cut their targets, calling this a prolonged turnaround and the company admitting that it needed A structural reset was kind of the final nail in the coffin. By early twenty twenty six, things looked quite grim. Ola had guided for over three point two five lakh units in sales for FI twenty six, but managed only about one point five lakh units in the first nine months.
2:25 Speaker 00 Revenue was expected to cross four thousand two hundred crore rupees, but was less than half of that. Even the revised targets that announced at the beginning of FI twenty six started to look out of reach. Profitability wasn't helping either. Gross margins or the share of revenue left after subtracting production costs were expected to cross thirty five percent, but sat at around twenty nine percent. EBITDA margins, which reflect operating profitability, were supposed to turn positive at five percent, but instead sat at six percent for the nine months ended FI twenty six. Put it all together and you'll see that this wasn't just one or two bad quarters. Ola's entire story seemed to have gone off track. And yet, fast forward to now, things seem to be changing.
3:07 Speaker 00 Sales in March jumped to ten thousand one hundred and seventeen units, up a whopping one fifty percent from Feb. Daily orders crossed thousand in the last week of the month, showing that demand is picking up again. And most importantly, the stock has started moving up sharply after the announcement of its in-house LFP battery, that is lithium iron phosphate battery. So, what's changed, you ask? Well, it looks like Ola is finally hitting the right notes to fix what was broken. For starters, it doubled down on its hyperservice push, which is a same-day servicing model it had introduced in early twenty twenty five. To clear backlogs and handle rising demand, Ola upgraded its existing service centers into hyperservice centers. At the same time, it tightened parts availability and improved diagnostics.
3:52 Speaker 00 The end result was that more than eighty percent of vehicles can now be serviced on the same day. And for the ones that can't, customers are offered a loaner or backup scooter. All of this has started to bring down turnaround times and more importantly, improve the overall customer service, something that was clearly missing not too long ago. The next thing is cost control. At its peak, Ola's consolidated quarterly operating expenses had ballooned to eight forty crore rupees in Q four FI twenty five. But in the last reported quarter, Q three F I twenty six, that number had nearly halved to four eighty four crore rupees. And this didn't happen by chance, the company rationalized its stores, trimmed its workforce by about five percent and tightened spending across the board.
4:32 Speaker 00 And it believes that its operating expenses could settle at steady two fifty to three hundred crore rupees over the next few quarters. You can already see the impact. Gross margins in Q three F I twenty six improved to thirty four point three percent compared to twenty five point eight percent and thirty point nine percent in the previous two quarters. In simple terms, Ola is now keeping a larger share of what it earns. And then there's the latest cost cutting move that got everyone's attention. Its new indigenous four six one double zero L F P cell, which is currently awaiting approval and could be integrated in vehicles from next quarter. For the uninitiated, L F P batteries rely on iron and phosphate instead of the usual nickel, manganese and cobalt, which is N M C. That makes them less vulnerable to commodity price swings and helps cost keeps in check.
5:17 Speaker 00 They also offer an advantage in terms of design. In context, the four six one double zero format is physically larger than Ola's current four six eight zero Bharat cell, which uses N M C chemistry. That means each cell can hold more active material, reducing the number of cells needed in a battery pack. Fewer cells naturally translate to simpler assembly, few connections and lower man traction complexity. So yes, that's where the cost saving will come from, but there's a trade off too. These L F P cells are more affordable but not necessarily better performers. The existing four six eight zero Bharat cell still wins when it comes to energy density, performance and delivering long range in a lighter package. So if your goal is to buy an E V two wheeler with high speed performance or a range of up to five hundred kilometers,
6:00 Speaker 00 which is the Indian driving cycle, L F P batteries may struggle to match what the four six eight zero cells can deliver. So the only thing these new batteries do for Ola is add another option that leans more toward cost efficiency than top end performance. Even then, this feels like a thoughtfully smart move because L F P batteries are known for better thermal stability and longer cycle life. In simple terms, they run cooler, last longer and reduce warranty risks, which makes them especially suited for hot weather. Markets like India. Of course, L F E batteries have lower energy density. So to deliver the same range as an N M C pack, you might need a slightly bigger or heavier battery. But if you look at it purely from an economic lens,
6:42 Speaker 00 you see that if a battery lasts longer and needs fewer replacements, the overall cost of ownership improves, even if the headline range is a bit lower. And that's where the strategy starts to come together. The four six eight zero N M C cell can continue to power premium offerings, where performance, range and lighter weight matter more. On the other hand, four six one double zero L F P cell gives Ola a way to push affordability, scale up volumes and even tap into opportunities like energy storage. But does all of this mean Ola is actually on track for a comeback? Well, that's a tricky call because despite the recent momentum, the numbers still raise questions. In Q three F I twenty six, for instance, Ola's EBITDA margin stood at minus sixty eight point seven percent.
7:27 Speaker 00 And to break even, meaning to stop making operating losses, the company needs to sell around fifteen thousand units a month, but it's still not consistently there. There's also a credibility gap that's hard to ignore. Over the past year, Ola has changed its targets multiple times. At the start of F I twenty six, it cut its sales and revenue guidance by about thirty percent and its break even target has been revised not once but thrice from fifty thousand units to about twenty five thousand units and now fifteen thousand units in Q three F I twenty six earnings call. Now, that's a seventy percent drop in just nine months. So even if the company is working to bring down costs, that kind of shift feels a bit stretched. Another piece of information to back this up is that eighty five to ninety percent of Ola's operating expenses are fixed,
8:11 Speaker 00 while only ten to fifteen percent are variable. Now, this looks great when sales go up because every additional scooter sold can significantly boost profits as most costs are already covered. But the flip side is that if sales don't pick up as expected, those fixed costs don't go away. And with limited room to cut further, losses can pile up quickly. So in many ways, Ola doesn't have too many levers left to pull. And the only option left now is to deliver on this new steady operating model it's talking about, which means the real answer won't come from announcements or short term stock moves, but from Q four results, which will be the real test. Because if the numbers don't follow through, the optimism we've seen in the past few days could fade away just as quickly.
8:55 Speaker 00 All right, folks, I will see you in the next one. Thank you for listening to today's episode. And if you want to share your feedback or suggestions, do drop us an email to [email protected] . Until next time.
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