Tiger Global invests $12 mn in e-bike venture Ather Energy
1 min read 30 May 2015, 12:22 AM ISTTwo-wheeler maker to spend fund on development, testing, production and launch of electric bikes expected to be out early next year
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Bengaluru: Two-wheeler maker Ather Energy has received $12 million funding from venture capital firm Tiger Global. The firm will spend it on development, testing, production and the launch of the electric bikes that are expected to be out early next year.
“We want to offer the Indian consumer a completely new driving experience by developing a product that would be at par with any petrol or electric two-wheelers available in the market today. This investment will help us continue to evolve our product and scale it towards launch," said Tarun Mehta, chief executive, who co-founded the company along with Swapnil Jain at the IIT Madras Research Park.
Ather had received its seed fund of $1 million from Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal of Flipkart and Raju Venkatraman of Medall Healthcare in last December. It raised the first round of funding from Aerospike founder V. Srinivas and the Technology Development Board, government of India. “We see great potential in Ather’s product offering and the technology and are confident that their maiden launch will attract a tremendous positive response. We look forward to partnering with the Ather team," Lee Fixel, a partner at Tiger Global, said in a statement.
Ather says its e-bikes, completely designed and manufactured in India, can match any 100 cc scooter in the market in performance, reliability, range of battery and charging time.
Its product—the Ather S340—will have sensors to monitor bike parameters and a dashboard to enable users create personalized profiles, choose riding modes and set other ride preferences.
The company said that it is seeing an increasing number of sign-ups for the bike “which is at an advanced stage of integration on the vehicle platform and testing of the functional prototype".
Test rides are scheduled for October and the launch is planned in three metro cities: Bengaluru, Chennai and Delhi.
