Ather Energy recently introduced its first electric smart scooters, Ather 340 and Ather 450 in the Indian market. These are India’s first homegrown electric scooters and they come equipped with a long list of features. Check out our detailed report about the new Ather 340 and Ather 450 here. Apart from the new electric smart scooters, Ather Energy also introduced Ather Grid, a network of charging stations spread at strategic locations throughout Bangalore.
In recent updates, the two-wheeler brand is reportedly planning to launch an electric motorcycle for the Indian market and may introduce one in two years’ time. Speaking to ETAuto, Tarun Mehta, co-founder & CEO of Ather Energy said that the brand should start work on a electric motorcycle very soon but it’ll take two years to arrive.
Mehta said, “Scooters now outsell bikes in all the top 10 cities. It’s painful to drive a petrol bike in crowded cities. In Bengaluru you can never leave the clutch, and you’ll have this wrist pain. You have zero storage space. With electric we hope to resolve some of that, you won’t need the clutch, hopefully we’ll be able to build storage space. Half our company wanted to build a bike, but we built a scooter. Very soon we should be starting work on a bike, but it’ll take two years.”
He also said that the electric motorcycle will need more speed which means that the team has to deal with lot of issues.
Mehta added, “Bike needs much more speed, like 130-140 kmph. You have to deal with a lot of issues and frequencies that you don’t get at 70-80 kmph. The amount of testing, validation really goes up. The chassis is very different. The architecture of some of the components – like the charger, battery, battery management system, dashboard – could remain very similar, but all will have to scale up in terms of capacities.”
Source: ET Auto