Start-ups in the ride-sharing and electric vehicle charging businesses are now offering electric two-wheeler and three-wheelers with innovative options such as battery swaps.
Following cab aggregator Ola, which is now making e-scooters, Bounce, a Bangalore based start-up operating in the dockless scooter sharing platform, has unveiled its electric scooter called Bounce Infinity E1. The start-up is offering its customers the option of buying the scooter without the battery and subscribe to its swappable battery service.
Start-up Magenta, a charge point operator, has deployed 100 electric cargo vehicles under its electric vehicle enabled transport (EVET) plan, a last-mile delivery platform in Bangalore.
The Bounce Infinity E1 scooter with battery and charger is priced Rs 68,999 (Delhi ex showroom).
The price for scooters with battery-as-service is Rs 45,099 (Delhi ex showroom). The user will have to pay additional subscription for using battery as a service option.
Customers pay for battery swaps, whenever they swap an empty battery with a fully charged one from Bounce’s swapping network.
“This pushes the running costs of the scooter down by 40 per cent compared with conventional scooters. The Bounce Infinity E1 will also be offered with the battery, which can be removed from the scooter and charged by customers at their home or office or wherever convenient,” said Vivekananda Hallekere, CEO and co-founder, Bounce.
Magenta, which has been developing charging solutions under its “ChargeGrid” brand, launched its e-Mobility platform under the “EVET” brand. Under EVET, Magenta is operating over 110 electric cargo transport services using the electric mobility platform.
With this flag off, Magenta EVET is formally rolling out FaaS (Fleet as a Service), enabling fleet owners, fleet operators, and driver entrepreneurs to plan, book, and pay for bundled single stop EV services including fleet, charging and parking services. This will be rolled out in Bangalore, where Magenta went live with more than 150 charging points last month.
Revolt Motors, which sells RV400, the flagship electric motorcycle, is expanding its retail presence by entering the Eastern India market. The company opened its first store in Calcutta and 16th retail store across the country.
With the growing demand for EV’s in the state, the West Bengal government has introduced various initiatives to accelerate the process of EV adoption and is targeting 10 lakh vehicle registrations to be EVs by 2025. In addition, the government has set up a dedicated EV cell and confirmed no road tax and registration fees on electric wheelers.
“Calcutta being a key market in India has a huge demand for premium and performance-based EV vehicles and the RV400 is the perfect fit to meet their requirement,” said a company spokesperson.
