German luxury carmaker Mercedes-Benz on Thursday said it’ll start selling its all-electric SUV EQC across all dealerships in India under the phase II clinical trial expansion strategy.

Mercedes-Benz India had launched the EQC in 2020 and was so far available in six select cities across 14 locations.

The company said it’s also re-opened bookings from Thursday for subsequent batch of EQCs, having sold out the primary batch after the vehicle was launched in October 2020 at a starting price of Rs 99.3 lakh.

“Mercedes-Benz (India) dealers across the 50 cities and 94 locations, are going to be equipped with EQC trained manpower and equipment to supply a hassle free ownership experience for the EQC owners,” the corporate said during a statement.

Mercedes-Benz India director and CEO Martin Schwenk said, “Pioneering the posh EV market in India with the EQC was a crucial decision for us and a step taken within the right direction. With the growing customer demand for the EQC, we are now expanding our EV penetration to 50 Indian cities, covering our entire retail network spread.”
This will enable more customers across Indian cities to have the EQC and join the transition to luxury e-mobility, he added.

“Commencement of phase II clinical trial expansion for the EQC is in line with our broader vision of making a long-term, worry-free, sustainable e-mobility ecosystem for our customers in India,” Schwenk said.

This will enable more customers across Indian cities to have the EQC and join the transition to luxury e-mobility, he added.

“Commencement of phase II clinical trial expansion for the EQC is in line with our broader vision of making a long-term, worry-free, sustainable e-mobility ecosystem for our customers in India,” Schwenk said.

Mercedes-Benz globally is pursuing an aggressive EV strategy of ‘EV first to EV only’, and in India the high acceptance level of the EQC makes the corporate confident that, electric is that the future, he added.

The company said the new EQC will an upgraded 11 kW on-board charger. The new on-board charger will charge the 80 kWh battery in 7 hours half-hour from 10 per cent to 100 per cent state of charge, rather than the 11 hours taken earlier