The IIT-Stanford-Harvard Founder Who Saw India's Battery Problem Before Anyone Else — and Built a ₹10,000 Crore Vision Around It

In 2017, Rajat Verma noticed something that most people in India's nascent EV ecosystem were choosing to ignore. Electric vehicles were being celebrated as the clean future of mobility. But the batteries that would power those vehicles — packed with lithium, cobalt, nickel, and manganese — would eventually die. And when they did, nobody had a credible plan for what would happen next. All of those materials would go to waste, or worse, be processed informally in ways that were dangerous to people and the environment. And India would keep importing all the same raw materials again from China.

Lohum was founded in 2018 to address battery waste and produce sustainable critical materials, supporting India's energy transition and reducing dependence on imports through recycling — ensuring that the promise of EVs truly delivers for people and the planet.

Seven years later, that founding thesis has been validated beyond what Verma probably imagined. And the company he built is now targeting ₹10,000 crore in revenue — while acquiring lithium mines in Zimbabwe.

WHAT LOHUM ACTUALLY DOES

Lohum is India's largest diversified producer of sustainable critical minerals — the materials that go into batteries. The company currently operates a battery recycling capacity of 25,000 metric tonnes per annum, a 1,000-MT nickel refinery targeted for 3x expansion, a 4,500-MT aluminium and copper refinery, a 1,000-MT lithium refinery, and a 1,200-MT cobalt refinery targeted for 2x expansion.

Lohum's 80% share of India's critical materials market for key energy transition industries as of 2024 gives it a structural dominance that comes from being first, from building proprietary processing technology, and from investing in the reverse logistics network — collecting batteries from EV manufacturers, BESS operators, and consumer electronics companies — that feeds the recycling operation.

Revenue grew from ₹308 crore in FY23 to ₹530 crore in FY24, compounding at 70–75% annually. (Bloomberg) Verma confirmed the company crossed the ₹1,000 crore revenue run-rate and continues to expand at this pace.

THE ZIMBABWE BET AND THE ₹10,000 CRORE TARGET

The Zimbabwe lithium mine acquisition represents Lohum's most significant strategic move — and the one that changes its identity from a recycling company to a fully integrated critical minerals platform.

Recycling is circular — it recovers materials from batteries that already exist. Mining is linear — it extracts virgin materials directly. Together, they give Lohum the ability to supply lithium to Indian and global battery manufacturers regardless of whether the battery recycling supply chain is sufficient to meet demand. As EV adoption accelerates in India, battery waste volumes will grow — but there is always a lag between when EVs are sold and when those batteries become available for recycling. The Zimbabwe mine closes that gap.

Lohum is also planning the UAE's first battery recycling factory in partnership with the UAE government, targeted to begin operations in 2026. International expansion into the Gulf — a major logistics hub — creates a global collection and processing network that no Indian competitor currently has.

The company announced a ₹500 crore rare earth refining hub with a $100 million fundraise and confirmed IPO plans by 2027. Verma confirmed a pre-IPO round of approximately ₹1,000 crore is being planned before the public listing.

WHY THIS MATTERS FOR INDIA

Verma's central argument is clear: India needs scale, not fragmented capacity, to compete with China in critical minerals. China processes over 90% of the world's battery-grade lithium and cobalt. India imports almost all of it. Lohum's integrated model — mining, recycling, and refining under one company — is the architecture India needs to build genuine critical mineral sovereignty.

The ₹10,000 crore revenue target requires roughly 10x growth from current levels — ambitious but consistent with the trajectory. Lohum aims to scale 20-30 times, with new manufacturing facilities and expanded global partnerships, to help India become a global leader in sustainable battery materials.

An IIT Kanpur, Stanford, and Harvard Business School graduate who spent years thinking about battery chemistry before founding a company — Rajat Verma is one of the more unusual founders in Indian cleantech. The problem he chose to solve has, over seven years, proven to be exactly as important as he thought it would be.