• Home
  • EV News
  • EV Blogs
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Vehicles
    • Sales
    • Electric Cars
    • Tata Electric Cars
    • Electric Scooters
    • OLA Electric
    • Electric Cycles
    • Electric MotorCycles
    • Electric Cargo Vehicles
    • Campus Vehicles
  • Categories
    • Community Charging
    • Buyer's Guides
    • Real Life EV Stories
    • How To Guides
    • EV Test Reports
    • EV Travelogues
    • EV Conversions
    • Events
    • Educate
  • About Us
  • Community
    • Discord
PluginIndia Electric Vehicles

Suggestions for Ather Energy

3/1/2015

15 Comments

 
By Johnson
Let me congratulate Ather on their success in getting funding of $1 million. They have done a lot of hardwork to deserve it. But let me warn that Mahindra had invested 20 times more in the Mahindra e2o and are struggling to sell. Let's not repeat the mistakes of e2o.

But before coming to that let me say that Raju Venkatraman, Sachin and Binny Bansal have given the Indian Automobile industry a big boost by investing in the Ather idea. If successful, this will surely change the face of motorcycling not only in India but also in Africa and South East Asia.

Ather has an advantage over the Chinese
Provided with the right accessories (like elegantly designed solar panels as a roof), these bikes could literally be used where ever the sun shines, even in places where there is zero infrastructure for electricity. In places like Africa where there is enough sun but no electric power the bike could even double up as power plant to power electrical devices. Forget Africa there are so many places in India that do not have electricity. For such places the roof solar panel is a great accessory.

Vehicles are a category where India can take on the Chinese mass manufacturing. The Chinese will not find much success in this space as compared to other products like toys, footwear, phones etc.


Vehicles – both Bikes & Cars are "belongings", where there is a lot of emotional attachment and people want to own it over a much longer period. Vintage is a word that is taken with pride in automobile world. Chinese tried their way by launching a lot of electric bikes in India in a huge way around the year 2007 and they did manage to milk the initial curiosity by selling lakhs of poor quality of electric bikes costing around Rs 20,000 to Rs 30,000. Actually these bikes were use and throw bikes, designed to be discarded after the lead-acid battery runs out.

Apart from this there was one more serious problem. The bikes were coupled with possibly the lowest quality battery, some of which stopped working within 6 months. A simple replacement with an Indian Battery brand would have solved at least 80% of the cases, but this was not to be. People were expecting replacement and dealers not only wanted no part of it as they were getting much less profit as the bikes themselves were very low priced.

Some people who used the bike above 2 yrs were shocked to find plastic panels & parts of  their bikes falling apart. This was unlike anything that they had handled before. There was much confusion in the market. There was also no "company to contact" and most of the dealer contacts were with websites like 'alibaba'. There was utter confusion in the market. To solve this problem lots of Indian companies were finally pushed by Chinese manufacturers to assemble their bikes in India and push it as their bikes – the result was companies like Hero Electric, Yo-Bikes, Ampere Bikes, BSA Motors, TVS Electric, Ultra Motors, Enigma Motors, EKO, Lectrix, etc. All of them have electric bikes of identical specifications but different colors.

Mistakes made by Mahindra Reva
Lets come back to the mistakes of the Mahindra e2o. The biggest mistake is that they have for one model for 10 yrs.
I know the e2o is a big step up over the classic Reva but basically it was just one model the subcompact to compete with other subcompacts and compared price wise all the other subcompacts were much cheaper.


Mahindra Reva should have brought in the electric maxximo and verito soon. Another vehicle they could have introduced is the electric autorickshaw. It sounds unbelievable that China was successful in selling over 200,000 electric rickshaws in Delhi alone while an Indian company is struggling to sell 1% of that number of electric cars since 10 yrs!

If you compare the e2o with the Electric Rickshaw they are worlds apart. e2o is so smart and suave. It is the smartest car yet in India even above the BMWs, VWs, Audis, Mercs etc while the Electric Rickshaw is easily the most silly looking, boxy and boring vehicle in the country. What makes the difference is that Electric Rickshaw is practical costing between Rs 55,000 to 80,000 yet it pulls 8 people at 40 kmph. Anyone can modify the vehicle to increase the speed or pulling power from parts bought from the open market.


But the task before Ather is not as daunting as it was for e2o. Bikes are easy to sell and do not come with added baggage (parking problems, toll fees, higher cost). If Ather bikes can reach 55 kmph, have a good quality battery and can climb gradients like flyovers the bikes will sell in lakhs. To become the top scooter company they have to sell in millions. If they can do that then they will be one of the best companies in the world!

The best thing is I feel the target is very much achievable! 
But they have to bring in much more variety than just a single model. 

Some types of e-bikes that Ather could think about
The first product launch should itself have at least 3 different kinds of model. Each model should be completely different from the other and one of them should be a 3 wheel bike. 
I have listed below a few I could think of and also mentioned their advantages.
Picture
This is the normal motor bike that could also have a rather elongated mid-section to accommodate more people.  Please ignore the tail pipe!  They have no place in EV's!
A scooter that Ather are bringing out might not appeal to college going men and others who prefer a sturdy motor bike than a scooter.
So a motor bike variant is a must.

Picture
A very practical bike. I love the windshield and the roof. The roof could be a little wider and carry a solar panel it will also protect the rider from drizzling rain and strong sun. The wind shield would be aerodynamic and improve range efficiency. It will also protect the rider from the wind or rain coming in his eyes and water splashes from vehicles ahead of him. Tinting the glass would lower the glare of sunlight or vehicle headlights coming from the opposite direction. Allows the rider better visibility in all climate. Again, please ignore the tail pipe in the image.

Ather could raise eyebrows and create great design innovations by working on such a bike.



Picture
Solar panel on its roof will ensure that the bike has enough juice... continuously charging it almost 10 hrs a day or as long as the sun is up.

The frame and panels can be sold as an accessory. 

Picture
The Trike. Non-development of a 3 wheel bike (trike) would be a very big mistake on the side of Ather. The advantages of these bikes are that they can be used by kids, elderly (pensioners) and women. They need no side stand or parking stand. Such a bike can be parked perpendicular with the footpath by putting the front wheel on the footpath and the rest of the bike on the gutter on the road side. These bikes can take heavier battery thus can travel longer range. These bikes can also have bigger luggage compartment. Front and rear luggage grill can make this bike a royal shopping companion. 
These bikes could be sold with 2 options slow speed one & higher speed one.




Picture
The Heavy duty trike!
Can carry even heavier batteries for increasing range up to 600 kms!!!


Picture
And last but not the least the aweinspiring the Adult sized electric Quad. These bikes are fun to ride and great if few are bought by each HomeStay owners or Hotels and provided on rent toTourist to go around their estate or to get around town. A solar panel shed is all it would take to get the batteries recharged.


Final Words
As i said, Ather should look to sell millions and not few thousands!  They will need to think big.  We do understand that the technology is being prepared and the first model will be out next year.  But work on the future models need to start right away.
Releasing a motor bike along with the scooter is a must.  Not everyone would like a scooter.  A peppy motor bike would appeal to college kids and others.
Ather Energy - You guys are a breath of fresh air in the Indian EV industry.  We @ PluginIndia wish you the best!
15 Comments
Sateesh Reddy
5/1/2015 05:58:20 am

First of all, i would like to congratulate the Ather team on the funding. We wish you the best.

Very good suggestions, these.
By launching only a scooter, there will be limited interest. Ather should definitely think of being a pioneer in helping people to move away from using Petrol Bikes.

I would definitely buy a motorcycle than a scooter.

Ather - u have an opportunity to make a big change and we wish you the best!

Reply
Swapnil Jain
5/1/2015 07:04:06 am

Thank you Mr. Johnson for the suggestions and Mr. Reddy for the interest in Ather.

Ather's long term vision targets replacing all two wheeler in the market with electric one's. Scooter is just a beginning and for Ather sky is the limit. We will get the other products out soon but we need to first perfect our technology with this scooter. The major hurdle in EV is not that OEMs cannot design the vehicle it is mainly the lack of perfect technology and know how. As Ather is exactly working on the perfect technology you can be rest assured that Indian two wheeler industry is going to be oil free by 2020.

Reply
Kamlesh
6/1/2015 03:08:31 am

That is some vision and we all need to work towards it. We wish you the best in developing the technology that is needed.
Do let us know in way how PluginIndia can help and we would gladly do it!

Here are some nice technical goals to attain or minimum requirements that would be great to have to make your e-bike very compelling.

a) Minimum city range of 60 km with a 1kWh Li-Ion battery. Is this achievable?

b) Atleast 8-10 Nm (Newton meters) of torque @ 0 RPM (Electrics have max torque at 0 RPM)

c) Top speed of 70kmph

d) Acceleration of 0-40 under 10 seconds

e) Passively air-cooled, high efficiency motor, that should last many many years

f) Battery pack life to 80% for atleast 80,000 km

g) 20% to 100% charge time inside 1 hour in a normal 5 Amp or 15 Amp ports.

h) Support for Rapid charging? Would it be technically possible to support direct DC quick charging?

Reply
Dhivik link
19/2/2015 04:34:07 pm

Hi Kamalesh,

I have replied to your email as well. Very nice this website has turned out to be. Kudos to you and your team. I've missed sleep running through your pages and commenting on your posts.

On what has been asked by you above.

A ) A 1KWh you are approx looking at about 48V20Ah config. Now a lot of complexities arise. Currently there has to be a tradeoff between speed vs mileage vs weight . Speed can be pushed up by increasing your parameters on your motors. Magnets Size, Wiring and Sensors. Considering we speaking about BLDC "hub" motors. Now at 60kmph getting 60 with this configuration at about 83% ~ 87% motor efficiency is quite daunting a task keeping in mind the weight of the vehicle as well.

B ) Will have to check with my technical team for right answer.

C) Easily attainable. But with speed comes risk. It is multiplied to a higher degree on an E2W as its silent. Also factor in the fact that in India road sense and pedestrians crossing sense is of a lower level.

D) Attainable. I know of a manufacturer in India who has been working on an AC motor, which can clock 0-100 in 4 sec ; 94Hp and with a torque rating of 95Nm@5100rpm. So yes, there definitely is a lot which is coming up in this space.

E) Agree.

G ) It depends on how much of a C rating current can be fed into batteries. 0 - 80% on a 1kWh can be done in about an 30 ~45 minutes to be safe.

H) Having an onboard charging unit solves most of these issues.

Dhivik link
19/2/2015 04:11:06 pm

Dear Swapnil,

Congrats on the funding. Your LP's are clean which is an added advantage. I know of another company in the same space which raised equity and from what the market seems they are on a downward spiral.
Be wary. And congrats again on the investment.
" Indian two wheeler industry is going to be oil free by 2020 " NEMMP is looking at about 6 Million EV's from 0.3 Million now. Which is a staggering growth rate of about 2000%.. Which seems to be a little OTT. You saying that an industry which has been manufacturing on an average at current rate of 6~8 Million vehicles per year ( in the last 10 years) is going to go all away ? Now that for me is shocker. But nevertheless, you could still use oil to cool electric motor temperatures. So to a certain level, Oil can still find use in an electric vehicle.

Congrats again.

Reply
Ramesh Krishnan
5/1/2015 08:35:51 am

Best of luck Ather. India needs good bikes and seems like Ather is the answer.

Reply
Liju Vaidhyan
6/1/2015 06:35:49 am

Ather is doing a great work, but they have to be very careful before throwing any Cards in indian automotive market, because here in India consumers are totally different from around the world.
For example: Around the globe Suzuki is known for its bike but in India for cars.
Whenever their is good product on the market they wont sell in numbers but a bad product with good marketing sells more.
For eg: Maruti SX4 2012 vs Mitsubishi Cedia(they stopped producing in 2013 lack of sale).
Here people only go for the product in which service is good. Take any product in this account product will sell if the company has the maximum number of service station but consumers wont think that they have to visit N number of time to service by buying a bad product in place good product.
many companies got bankrupt due to this like LML had great variety of motorcycles but closed, Kinetic brought in fresh technologies very long time back but closed.

So be careful before planning the production please plan for service network before launching it, may be product do not needs service but you have to show it on the map.

Because here people think multiple times to buy new brand, always their be a group of people behind every customer to suggest on which vehicle they should go for.
Ather have to plan their brains out for marketing and sales.
In India product only sells if you have good sales man.(Arey sab bikta hai Lekin Bechne Wala Chahiye).

But hats off for your work keep the spirit high.

Reply
Johnson
6/1/2015 01:58:26 pm

Liju... you are correct.. but in this case (EV) there is almost zero need of service/maintenance...

As for sales... Ather could even take the orders online... via Flipkart.

Reply
Liju Vaidhyan
8/1/2015 03:48:14 am

But most consumers will be new to this type of technology they would not understand and which will develop a scare on their mind set, People will be thinking like" in case anything breaks down, no local mechanics will be able to fix it". as if now most of the Ebike users use the bike till it runs, when this thing stops they don't have any Idea how to fix it so they dump it and buy a new Petrol powered and say at least a road side mechanic can fix it.
They start to curse the company and curse the technology, they swear that they wont buy another electric bike in future.
So in my point of view Ather have to tell every consumer that they will surely back them up in case of emergency or any breakdown situation(Water entry, Body damage, Electrical problem Etc) they have to make plans on servicing. As Tesla Motors is taking care of its customers.
At least they should have field station in every major cities of the country.

Reply
Kamlesh
8/1/2015 05:26:26 am

Very important point. Service stations are a must

Johnson
10/1/2015 07:57:23 am

Yeah good point Liju...

maybe Ather could give their dealer some checklist to go through in case of problems which can be solved easily if the faults are small. Also Ather should convince the dealers to play a more interactive role (rather than just sell-it-forget-it sales office) and to give genuine feedback to the company and then Ather could advice the dealers or take advice from the Dealers on what solutions could be taken to solve the problems.

If a solution can be found locally then good. Ather could also provide a problem-solution information/diagram on their website and to all dealers. Once the solution is figured then parts must be available to replace either from the company or locally. This is one of the reason I always suggested to use locally available parts as in the first 2 yrs it will be difficult to provide parts to a lot of dealers.

Now since Ather say that even the tyre is designed in-house... would using local tyres be possible? If possible will it lower the range, speed & balance? I dont know? Hope local tyres can be used else its going to be very difficult. But this is ok as till the first 2yrs the demand for tyres wouldn't crop up but some other part might need to be fixed.


Reply
Johnson
18/1/2015 05:13:47 am

Examples of long-bikes:
Harley Davidson+DFT = Yellow Bullet:
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/iipcache/39115.jpg

Real life long-bike in Udaipur:
http://udaipurtimes.com/ghost-rider-in-udaipur/

Long-Bike in Golmaal 3:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/joegoauk4/139044047/

Its clone:
http://www.royalloops.com/photos/image/7588/clone-of-golmaal-bike

Reply
Dinesh
18/1/2015 07:31:48 am

I was working for the electric vehicles for the last fourteen years, from 2001 to 2008 i was with Reva and looking after entire north India as a Regional manager. Now working with Saera Electric Auto Pvt. Ltd, Delhi , leading manufacturer of E-rickshaw, Saera is the only company who has got Type Approval certification from ICAT Manesar, Gurgaon, Haryana.

Would like to up date my self about Electric vehicles.

Thanks and regards.

Reply
Dhivik link
19/2/2015 04:36:48 pm

Hi Dinesh,

I think the last that i checked on ICAT there are about 3 companies which has gotten Type Approval for E-Rickshaws.

Am i right on it ?


Reply
Suman Rao
4/8/2016 09:27:14 am

Heartening to read about plans for a solar power driven TRIKE AND QUADRICYCLE for the elderly and quite simple those who want to ride safe, A SUGGESTION: Please note the issues which prevent people from riding on scooters. Lack of protection from sun, rain, ACID ATTACKS and stealing of bags from luggage racks. Along with a solar-paneled roof can you have a light-weight canvas cover for the driver? Please make a provision for an elevated side-car attachment, also with a special accessory of canvas cover. It should have smart features in this age and day. WILL SURELY BUY ONE IF THESE FEATURES ARE INCORPORATED.

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Categories

    All
    Ask Your EV Guru
    Blogs From Heart & Soul
    Buyers Guides
    Charging Stations
    Clean Energy
    Commercial Vehicles
    Community Initiatives
    Conversion Kits
    Electric Bikes
    Electric Bus
    Electric Cars
    Electric MotorCycles
    Electric Scooters
    Events
    EV Expos & Exhibitions
    EV Industry News
    EV Sales
    EV Technology
    EV Travelogues
    How To Guides
    Interviews
    Podcasts
    RE:LIVE Events
    Student Projects
    Surveys

    Picture
    Picture

    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013

    Picture

    RSS Feed

Plug in india

About us
Advertise with us
Contact us

Privacy Policy
Terms of Service

Support US

Get access to exclusive perks
  • Become a YouTube member
  • Become a Patreon

Subscribe to our newsletter

© COPYRIGHT 2019. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • EV News
  • EV Blogs
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Vehicles
    • Sales
    • Electric Cars
    • Tata Electric Cars
    • Electric Scooters
    • OLA Electric
    • Electric Cycles
    • Electric MotorCycles
    • Electric Cargo Vehicles
    • Campus Vehicles
  • Categories
    • Community Charging
    • Buyer's Guides
    • Real Life EV Stories
    • How To Guides
    • EV Test Reports
    • EV Travelogues
    • EV Conversions
    • Events
    • Educate
  • About Us
  • Community
    • Discord