Bhavish Aggarwal, Chairman and Group CEO of Ola, announced on Monday that the company's manufacturing unit in Tamil Nadu, Ola Futurefactory, will be run entirely by women. According to Bhavish, the Ola Futurefactory will be the world's "largest all-women factory." "Aatmanirbhar Bharat requires Aatmanirbhar women!" he stated.

He also shared a video featuring the first batch of women hired to work at the facility.

Ola Futurefactory, which spans 500 acres, will employ over 10,000 women when manufacturing reaches full capacity. In the first phase, the company indicated that it would begin with a 10 lakh annual production capacity and subsequently scale it up to a 20 lakh capacity based on market demand.

Ola Electric said that once completed, its plant would have an annual capacity of one crore units, or "15% of the world's total two-wheeler manufacturing."

In fact, studies suggest that simply granting women equal labour-force participation can boost India's GDP by 27%. However, this will necessitate active and conscious efforts from all of us, particularly in manufacturing, where involvement remains the lowest at only 12%. To make India the world's manufacturing hub, we must prioritise upskilling and creating jobs for our female workforce, said Aggarwal.

In a process to become the world’s largest scooter manufacturing facility, the company had stated that it would initially start with 10 lakh annual production capacity and then scale it up to 20 lakhs, in line with market demand, in the first phase.

When fully completed, Ola Electric had claimed that its plant would have an annual capacity of one crore units, “that is 15 per cent of the world’s entire total two-wheeler production”.

The company had, on August 15, unveiled its Ola S1 electric scooter in two variants -- S1 and S1 Pro -- at ₹99,999 and ₹1,29,999, respectively.

While the sale was to start on September 8, it postponed the sale process by a week to September 15 as it faced “technical difficulties” in making the website for purchases live for customers.

Image source: Business line