Millat Tractors Enters E-Bike Manufacturing With Chinese Partner — Pakistan's EV Policy 2025-30 Finds an Anchor Player

Millat Tractors Limited (PSX: MTL) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding through a subsidiary with a leading Chinese electric-bike manufacturer to assemble, manufacture, and market e-bikes in Pakistan — a move that gives the federal government's National Electric Vehicle (EV) Policy 2025-30 its first heavy-industry anchor on the two-wheeler side and signals a serious recalibration of one of Pakistan's most established mechanical-engineering firms toward the electric powertrain.

What the MoU actually covers

The PSX disclosure, filed under the Listed Companies (Code of Corporate Governance) Regulations 2019, establishes a partnership for assembly, manufacturing, and marketing of Chinese-brand electric bikes in Pakistan. The structure is a subsidiary-level joint vehicle that lets Millat ring-fence the EV business from its core tractor operations while still leveraging the parent company's dealership network, after-sales infrastructure, and PSX-listed balance sheet.

The EV Policy 2025-30 context

The Government of Pakistan's National Electric Vehicle Policy 2025-30 targets 30% new-vehicle electrification by 2030, with two-wheelers and three-wheelers carrying the bulk of early-volume share precisely because they are cheaper to produce locally, easier to charge from a single-phase household connection, and replace the highest fuel-cost-per-kilometre segment of the on-road fleet.

• 2-wheeler share — roughly 19 million petrol motorcycles in Pakistan today; even a 10% e-bike share by 2030 means ~2 million units delivered.
• Fuel-cost arithmetic — a typical 70cc petrol motorbike costs Rs. 13,500–15,000/month in fuel; an e-bike charging from a household connection runs Rs. 2,000–2,800/month, payback inside 9–14 months.
• Grid impact — 2 million e-bikes adds an estimated 1,800–2,200 GWh/year of residential electricity demand, manageable in aggregate but concentrated in evening charging windows that overlap system peak.

Why Millat, and why now

Millat Tractors is one of the few Pakistani heavy-industry firms with the manufacturing engineering depth, supplier base, and dealer reach to actually scale a domestic e-bike build — versus the dozens of import-and-rebadge operators that currently dominate the segment. Tractor demand has flattened as agricultural mechanisation slows in the under-12-acre farm tier; pivoting underutilised engineering and assembly capacity to e-bikes is a defensible margin play that doesn't require shutting the core business.

The Chinese partnership matters because battery cell quality, BMS firmware, and motor-controller IP are the hardest pieces to develop domestically. A Chinese partner with proven cell chemistry, paired with Millat's local assembly and dealer network, is the lowest-friction path to scale — much the way the original Suzuki-Pakistan and Honda-Atlas joint ventures unlocked the petrol-motorcycle market in the 1990s.

The power-sector implications

Two million e-bikes by 2030 would displace roughly 800–900 million litres of petrol annually — material both for the fuel-import bill (saving USD 600–700 million/year at current prices) and for the consumer-spending-power equation. But the corresponding 1,800–2,200 GWh of new residential demand has to land somewhere, and right now Pakistan's evening peak (6 PM to 11 PM) is exactly when most charging would occur.

NEPRA has not yet issued time-of-use tariffs for residential consumers; IESCO has signalled a pilot. Without a price signal that pushes charging into the overnight off-peak window, e-bike growth will inflate the evening peak that already drives most fuel cost adjustment and capacity-payment exposure.