Ather S340 - The electric scooter to change the future!!

It’s been a long time since this blog has been up but I haven’t really got myself to putting up posts. But recently I attended an open-session by an upcoming two-wheeler manufacturer and I think it’s the perfect time to put pen to paper.

The Ather S340

It really is a sign of the times that the first post is going to be about an electric scooter, designed and built entirely here in India. What makes it even more interesting is that the team behind this venture is a group of engineers fresh out of IIT Madras. They call themselves Ather and they are bringing to life an electric scooter which could transform the two-wheeler industry in India. This revolutionary scooter has been christened the S340 (it stands for a Scooter, with a 3KW motor and 40aH battery. Clever name, I must say. Just wait till you see how clever the actual scooter is!! ) The scooter was unveiled at the SURGE conference at Bengaluru in Feb 2016 and the team is currently working on setting up the manufacturing and the pre-orders could begin anytime in the second half of 2016.

Given the total dependence of human beings on fossil fuels for transportation of any sort, over centuries, it was only a question of time before we started looking for cleaner and more sustainable options. Out of the various alternatives being developed, electric seems to be winning the race and with Tesla coming out, all guns blazing, it definitely seems to be the future of transportation. Given this background, it is only a matter of time before electric vehicles becomes main-stream. India has already seen the reva, which was the first all-electric car manufactured in the country. The initial version didn’t do too well, mainly due to the tiny size and the disproportionate cost of ownership. Then came the electric scooters from Hero and YoBykes. The Hero scooters have seen some traction but overall the electric scooters in India have been underpowered and are seen as poor cousins of the petrol-guzzling ones. Overall, the electric scene in the Indian automobile industry market doesn’t seem to be too promising.

However, that is all set to change with the S340. The S340 promises to be a cloud-connected, lithium ion battery powered scooter, which could give the conventional petrol scooters a run for their money. It boasts a top speed of 72 kmph which is on-par with most other scooters in the market. It goes an average of 60 kilometres on a full charge, which would be more than sufficient for most day-to-day scenarios. On the charging front, it charges up to 80% in less than an hour. In the time it takes to charge your phone, your scooter is effectively on a full tank. And that too at a minuscule fraction of the cost (it would take around 2 units of electricity for a full charge).

When the whole is greater than the sum of the parts

The scooter is a well-balanced piece of machinery with a 49:51 weight distribution. This even distribution of weight has been enabled by a centrally located battery pack which is placed near the footboard. The scooter also sports a mono-shock absorber at the rear and has disc brakes at both ends. With a belt delivering the power to the rear wheel, the scooter is a no-maintenance vehicle with no engine oil or chain lubrication required at all.

With electric vehicles, generally the battery is the biggest cause of concern. But Ather is confident that the batteries are good to last more than 50,000kms. The charging can be done from any household 5A wall-socket which can be found almost everywhere. Ather is also building their Fast charge charging station network across the city which would allow riders to charge their scooters much faster than the normal chargers. Experience centers would be setup in Bangalore, Chennai and Pune which would allow early adopters to get a better idea of the machine and experience the journey of the machine from concept to reality. With these features itself, the S340 proves to be a better option than most scooters on the market. However, the best is yet to come.

The smart dashboard

Though the electric heart is a decided advantage, it is the brain of this scooter that blows you away. At the center of it all, is a Linux based dashboard with 7 inch touch screen that integrates with cloud-based data through a 3G SIM card to enable constant data transfer and OTA updates. This dashboard is how you interact with the scooter. The scooter knows who’s riding it and various sensors capture and store vital pieces of information like the physical attributes, riding behaviour, efficiency and average mileage. A personalized profile of the rider is built on the basis of this data and synced with the cloud. It also offers GPS, navigation aids and integration with Google Maps. So if I am riding home, the scooter examines my profile and calculates if I can get home on the available charge taking into consideration my riding style. And some time in the future, this estimate would also take into consideration the ambient weather conditions and traffic conditions, thereby giving a very real-time and very accurate estimate.

A mobile app is also in the works which will allow the user to view his riding characteristics, which would help him to understand how he rides and what can be done better. The app gives out Zen score based on how good a rider you are (how cool is that?) The app also lets you locate your vehicle, alerts you to suspicious activity, and tells you the charge on the battery and expected distance you can travel. The scooter also has a diagnostic system built-in which keeps monitoring the internal mechanisms in real-time and alerts the rider to any parts about to fail. Ather calls this predictive maintenance and this feature will help owners to take care of a problem, before it actually breaks down your machine.

And this brings us to the customer service part, which again has been revolutionized. Gone are the days of showrooms and service centers. The S340, when made available, can be ordered only online. And any time the scooter requires a service you just call their customer care center and request a pickup. Ather comes to your doorsteps, takes the scooter to their place and gets it back once the service is complete.

On paper, Ather’s S340 is a great product for a very relevant problem. But whether it succeeds in the cut-throat Indian two-wheeler market is something only time will tell. And to ensure that it succeeds, it would have to ensure the customer sees the value in a product. The tentative price is a little less than 1 lakh, which would make it as expensive as a Vespa.

Ather is conducting open sessions at their Bangalore HQ for their prospective customers. Drop by if you think this scooter is cool. Keep an eye on their facebook page for updates. In the mean time these are some pics from one of their open sessions which I managed to attend.

But the ultimate idea of the Ather S340 is to make the internal combustion extinct. Some what like the floppy disk. ( And their free goodies say this the best :) )