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Fueling with electricity offers a whole lot of advantages that are clearly not available with conventional internal combustion engine vehicles that we have been using to date. Electric motors react quicker than the latter. They are very responsive and have impressive torque.
Besides, what's more, important is that the EVs follow the path of sustainable development because they are not driven by traditional fossil fuels like petrol, diesel, or LPG. Electric vehicles thus, significantly contribute towards reducing the emissions that lead to climate change and smog, thereby putting a stop to many other forms of ecological damages and man-made environmental disasters too.
Choosing electric vehicles for transport has been proven to improve public health and the environment. These are a few of the many reasons why electric vehicles are here to stay.
Among the most popular electric vehicle manufacturing companies is Ather. Ather is an Indian electric vehicle company founded by Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain in 2013 goes by the name Ather Energy Pvt. Ltd. It currently manufactures the electric scooters, Ather 450X and the Ather 450 Plus. Furthermore, it has also established the electric vehicle charging infrastructure, Ather Grid, and is one of the most prominent rivals of Ola Electric.
Here's the company profile of Ather Energy, Know all about its Owners, Funding and Investors, Business and Revenue Model, Growth, Challenges Faces, Name, Tagline, Logo and more.
Ather - Company Highlights
| Startup Name | Ather Energy |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | Bangalore, Karnataka, India |
| Industry | Automotive Electric vehicles |
| Founded | 2013 |
| Founders | Tarun Mehta, Swapnil Jain |
| CEO | Tarun Mehta |
| Area Served | India |
| Total Funding | $210.9 mn (2021) |
| Revenue | $10.72 mn (Rs 79.8 crore in FY21) |
| Website | www.atherenergy.com |
Ather Energy - Latest News
Ather Energy - About and How it Works?
Ather Energy - Name, Logo, and Tagline
Ather Energy - Founders and Team
Ather Energy - Startup Story
Ather Energy - Mission
Ather Energy - Business Model
Ather Energy - Revenue and Growth
Ather Energy - Funding and Investors
Ather Energy - Competitors
Ather Energy - Awards and Recognitions
Ather Energy - Challenges Faced
Ather Energy - Partnerships
Ather Energy - Future Plans
Ather Energy - Latest News
February 03, 2022 - MoU signed between Ather Energy and (ESCOMs) of Karnataka to set up 1,000 fast-charging stations for electric two-wheelers in Karnataka. Ather Energy will provide free charging services for two-wheeler electric vehicles.
January 14, 2022 - Ather has hiked the prices of its scooters by around Rs 5,500. The company has cited input costs to be the reason for the price increase. Ather will now be charging Rs 5475 for its Ather dot charger, which was previously sold for Re 1, as a result of the price increase.
December 31, 2021 - Ather launches its second outlet in Chennai. This time the EV manufacturing startup will also be retailing from Guindy. It will now have two retail outlets at Coimbatore and Tiruchy.
December 11, 2020 - Electric scooter manufacturer Ather Energy announced the launch of Ather 450X in 16 more cities in India, as part of its phase-2 expansion. These cities are Mysore, Hubli, Jaipur, Indore, Panaji, Bhubaneshwar, Nasik, Surat, Chandigarh, Vijayawada, Visakhapatnam, Guwahati, Nagpur, Noida, Lucknow and Siliguri.
October 31, 2020 - Ather Energy opens the full payment window for 450 Plus and 450X for the customers of Bangalore and Chennai. The company said that the scooters will be delivered within three weeks of payment.
August 31, 2019 - Electric scooter startup Ather Energy has announced the launch of a new home charging point - Ather Dot, for its Ather 450 customers.
Ather Energy - About and How it Works?
Ather Energy is a startup focused on designing and selling premium electric two-wheelers for the Indian market. Ather wants to change the perspective about electric vehicles by building high-performance, zero-maintenance, and smart electric vehicles.
The company has manufactured two scooter models at present - 450 Plus and 450X. They have also established an electric vehicle charging network called AtherGrid.
They own and operate their own experience centers (called AtherSpace) to give the customers a complete ownership experience. They’ve launched the Ather 450 back in September 2018 and released the Ather 450X all across the country on January 28, 2020.
Though the sale of new Ather 450 scooters had been discontinued by the company since November 28, 2020, the company has pledged to fill up the gap with their 450X and 450 Plus models, where the latter will be launched soon.
Ather 450x is currently being delivered in 11 Indian cities so far - Hyderabad, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, Kochi, Kozhikode, Kolkata, Coimbatore, Ahmedabad.
Ather Energy's customers believe that electric vehicles will shape urban commute in the years to come. They choose to own the experience of a vehicle that is built from scratch, offers an unparalleled ride, and is powered by intelligence.
Ather Energy - Name, Logo, and Tagline
The logo of Ather Energy represents, Every electrical circuit is different, but the two things that remain constant are: start- represented by the line and the stop- represented by the dot, in the circuit. This was much like Ather's long-term goal of building a company that fundamentally believes in using runnable electric energy as the future of innovation.
Ather's tagline goes: "All Brain. All Power. All Electric."
Ather Energy - Founders and Team
The founders of Ather Energy are Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain. They founded Ather Energy in 2013.
Tarun Mehta
Tarun is the Co-founder and CEO of Ather. Mehta is an IIT Madras alumnus, who has completed a Dual Degree, Engineering Design, before starting as a Deputy Manager at Ashok Leyland. He eventually decided to found Ather. Mehta interned at Mercedes Benz and BHEL during his college days.
Swapnil Jain
Swapnil Jail is the Co-founder at Ather. He is also an alumnus of IIT Madras and has completed his integrated Masters of Technology in Engineering Design. After completing a brief internship at General Motors and BHEL, Swapnil decided to found Ather with his college friend Tarun.
Ather currently operates with over 500 employees.
Ather Energy - Startup Story
Ather began its journey in October 2013 at the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras Research Park. Mehta and co-founder Swapnil Jain both IIT-M alumni (BTech & MTech batch of 2012 in engineering design) had set out to build India’s first smart electric scooter. They had brief stints at Ashok Leyland and General Motors respectively.
Mehta recalls the support of R. Krishnakumar, a professor at the Department of Engineering Design at IIT-Madras. “If a professor says, ‘Leave your job and come back; we will take care of everything,’ I think that is a great morale boost,” says the Ather CEO.
“For the first five-six months, we literally camped out of the department. We were just hanging around in his labs and other department labs before we sort of reached a conclusion that ‘This seems interesting and we should actually start a company and build a product.’ It was a very important phase and he was super supportive then.”
In December 2014, Flipkart founders, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal invested $1 million as the seed capital. Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal expressed positive sentiment towards the company and showed an inclination towards energy-efficient vehicles.
In December 2019, Ather Energy signed an MoU with the Government of Tamil Nadu to set up a 400,000 sq. ft. manufacturing plant for electrical vehicles in Hosur. The invested amount will be around ₹635 crores.
The company added two new products to its portfolio, the Ather 450X and the Ather 450 Plus in January 2020. The Ather 450X is a premium electric scooter built from the ground up by Ather. A step above the Ather 450 both in features and performance, the Ather 450X has been meticulously designed to redefine the two-wheeler riding experience in India.
Ather Energy - Mission
Ather's mission statement says, "At Ather, we want to build the future of mobility – one that is connected and electric. We truly believe electric is inevitable, there’s never been a better time. Intelligent vehicles are revolutionizing our commute experience, and the Ather 450 and 450X are at the cusp of this exciting reality. We are also in the midst of exploring the energy chain, including storing and distribution domains."
Sarika Anand
Ather Energy - Business Model
The company has announced an online-only purchase model for selling the product with doorstep service. It had set up its manufacturing unit in Whitefield, Bangalore which commenced production in 2018 with a capacity of 600 vehicles per week. The company has disclosed the price of the Ather 450 to be ₹1,35,000 and the price of Ather 450X is ₹1,38,006.
It also establishes Ather Grid, an electric vehicle charging infrastructure in the cities it is present in. The company has set up over 38 fast charging points in Bengaluru and 14 charging points in Chennai, as of July 2020.
Ather will be setting up its new 400,000 sq ft. facility in Hosur, Tamil Nadu by the end of 2022. The new facility will be designed to produce 100,000 units annually and is scalable to half a million units.
Anik Banerjee
Ather Energy - Revenue and Growth
Some highlights of the revenue and growth of Ather are:
- Ather Energy has been announced as the fourth largest selling two-wheeler EV in India in the first half of 2021, where the company has successfully sold 3677 units.
- Ather Energy's estimated annual revenue is currently recorded at $10.72 mn (around Rs 79.8 crores) as of FY21, which is a 126% increase from $4.74 mn (Rs 35.3 crores in FY20).
- There has also been a significant rise in the after-sales service vertical, which marked a 433.34% raise to Rs 1.6 crore during the last fiscal.
- Hero MotoCorp currently holds over 34.8% of the stakes in Ather
- The Hero MotoCorp-backed startup recorded over 8x growth in its operating revenue from INR 4.2 Cr in 2019 to INR 35.3 Cr in the year ended March 30, 2020. The company last raised INR 84 Cr from Hero MotoCorp in July 2020, which increased the auto giant's stake in Ather to 34.58%.
Ather Energy - Funding and Investors
Ather Energy has raised a total of $210.9 M in funding over 8 rounds. The latest funding of $56.46 mn was raised by Ather from Hero MotoCorp on January 14, 2022. Ather Energy has earlier raised Rs 130 crores ($17.24M) from Hero MotoCorp.
Ather Energy is currently funded by 5 main investors.
| Date | Round | Amount | Lead Investors |
|---|---|---|---|
| January 15, 2022 | - | $56.46M | Hero MotoCorp |
| October 10, 2021 | Series E | $17.24M | Hero MotoCorp Ltd. |
| November 7, 2020 | Series D | $35M | - |
| Jul 24, 2020 | Series C | $11.2M | Hero MotoCorp Ltd |
| May 28, 2019 | Series C | $51M | Sachin Bansal |
| Oct 27, 2016 | Series B | $27M | Hero MotoCorp Ltd |
| May 29, 2015 | Series A | $12M | Tiger Global Management |
| Dec 3, 2014 | Seed Round | $1M | - |
Ather Energy - Competitors
The top 10 competitors in Ather Energy's competitive set are:
- Ola Electric
- GoGreenBOV
- Ampere
- Okinawa Scooters
- AVERA
- Bajaj Auto
- Hero MotoCorp
- TVS
- Pure EV
- Tork Motors Pvt
Ather Energy - Awards and Recognitions
To sum up, some of the prominent awards and recognitions that Ather received would be:
- The Economic Times Start-up Awards, The Economic Times, 2016
- Most Promising Startup Impacting Automotive, IoT Next, 2016
- India Electric Mobility Technology Innovation Leadership Award, Frost & Sullivan, 2016
Ather Energy - Challenges Faced
“The biggest challenge and opportunity when you are building an electric vehicle in India is that there is no local ecosystem and that includes not just vendors but also talent among other things. We completely missed out on this when we started the company and that’s why our timelines started looking different. The amount of money started looking very different as we got more and more into it,” says Tarun Mehta, CEO of Ather Energy.
Being a hardware startup, Ather has seen its challenges where Tarun Mehta has pointed out that in the case of Ather, they "can't ship a minimum viable product." "With hardware, you can't 'move fast and break things", added Mehta. This impeded the growth and delivery of Ather hugely but the promising EV startup is finding ways to improve the delivery process and fasten the growth of the company.
Mehta also stated that for the EVs, "there's no ecosystem in place in India", which might have distributed the workload. Ather Energy CEO further added that the company is the sole manufacturer and distributor of the scooter, its batteries and other accessories and therefore, it is vital that it tests all of them thoroughly.
Another challenge for the scooters is that there isn't a promising culture of designing and developing products locally. "Finding the right talent to work at Ather has been challenging," Ather CEO said.
Ather Energy - Partnerships
The company has partnered with like-minded organizations to "accelerate the adoption of electric mobility for a sustainable future," says the Ather website. Some of the other popular partners of Ather Energy are WeWork and Altair. Here are some other partnership highlights of the company:
- BLive has become a strategic partner of Ather to promote EV adoption at tourist destinations on August 24, 2021
- Ather Energy was announced as the official partner of Kerala Blasters in October 2021
Ather Energy - Future Plans
According to Mehta, the big challenge that now lay ahead of them was how to not make Ather feel like a boring automotive company keeping the culture and excitement alive while still bringing in the rigours and discipline that they need to get a world-class hardware product out.
With the factory plant in Whitefield, Bengaluru, the company is ready to begin production and the orders coming in. Ather is getting ready with the first lot of production.
“The first lot planned is for 2,000 vehicles and over a year’s time, the production planned is 10,000 vehicles. Based on the supply chain constraints, we will have to decide the batch size of production,” says Jain, adding next will be ramp up both in sales and the product map. “When you do a new product, it is not very easy to assemble… manufacturing challenges will pop up. So, we will improve product from that perspective to be able to ramp up really fast.”
The team has begun work on developing a new vehicle platform that it says will be more scalable. It is slated to be ready soon. He won’t part with much financial detail, but according to Mehta, the 50,000 units sales mark is when on a per unit basis, the company ought to be able to break even. The challenge for electric two-wheeler companies, though, will be to attract new customers.
Ather stands big and tall in the growing space with a DNA going back to research labs, a design built from scratch, and a product that can be traced to custom spec sheets. Will that give it customers and success as a scooter company? Time will tell. But its journey this long is all about learnings, sucker punches, small wins, big bets, uncharted paths, and an early positioning in a market that holds promise.
Harshit Verma
Ather Energy - FAQ
Who is the owner of Ather Energy?
Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain founded the Indian electric vehicle company Ather Energy in 2013.
What is the price of Ather 450X in India?
The price of Ather 450X starts from Rs.1.18 Lakh and goes upto Rs.1.38 Lakh. Ather 450X is one of the two products offered by Ather energy.
Is Ather an Indian company?
Yes, India is the Country of origin of Ather Energy. The electric vehicle company was founded by Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain in 2013.
What is Ather Energy?
Ather Energy is a startup focused on designing and selling premium electric two-wheeler vehicles for the Indian market. The company has offered two electric scooters for the Indian market, Ather 450 and 450X.
What is the headquarters location of Ather Energy?
Ather Energy is an Indian electric vehicle company headquartered in Bangalore.
What companies do Ather compete with?
The top 10 competitors of Ather Energy are GoGreenBOV, Ampere, Okinawa Scooters, AVERA, Bajaj Auto, Hero MotoCorp, TVS, Pure EV, Tork Motors Pvt.
Source :- https://startuptalky.com/ Author :- Sarika Anand Date :- February 08, 2022 at 11:00AM