New Delhi, Jan. 6 -- Homegrown carmakers Tata Motors and Mahindra and Mahindra are increasingly improving the speed at which they develop products to gain market share in an intensely competitive domestic market, according to senior executives at auto component makers working with the companies. Indian carmakers have reached parity with European, Japanese and Korean automakers and are increasingly catching up to the speed of Chinese carmakers in rolling out new products, according to top executives at German component major BorgWarner and homegrown auto part maker Lumax Auto Technologies. This comes in the backdrop of Indian automobile manufacturer Mahindra and Mahindra reaching the number two rank in annual sales in 2025 for the first time in at least a decade, since retail registration data became available, toppling Korean carmaker Hyundai Motor. The shift is inevitable, Nalinikanth Gollagunta, chief executive officer (CEO) of Mahindra's automotive division, said. "It used to be 5 years, with Inglo (Mahindra's vehicle platform), we are now at 33 months or so, but the notion is, we have to keep collapsing that, there is no question," Gollagunta said in an interview on the sidelines of XEV 9S launch in November. While high-end vehicles require more sophistication, in segments like sub-4-meter cars, "you need to have the agility to move fast." Tata Motors did not respond to Mint's request for comments. However, auto component makers and analysts suggest that the acceleration is broadly in line with Indian carmakers looking to take a leaf out of China's playbook and surpass European, Korean, and Japanese incumbents. Chinese automakers could roll out new products in 24 months, compared to a 4-6 year product cycle at legacy automakers worldwide, according to a Boston Consulting Group update in November 2024. The country's largest carmaker, Maruti Suzuki, and the third-largest carmaker, Hyundai Motor India, are units of Japanese Suzuki and Korean Hyundai. Industry executives say that digital tools, expanded auto component capacities and budgets, and flexible vehicle platforms are accelerating product development. Chandrasekhar Krishnamurthy, global director and head of product management at BorgWarner, told Mint that Indian automakers are leaning towards the China playbook in how they develop new products, but with their own touch, including requests for specifications. "In India, we are seeing that they want to also go in the same direction where they would like to have the China speed, but we also see that there are more specific requirements Indian OEMs want," Krishnamurthy said....