Underdog Ather is the real challenger to India’s legacy two-wheeler makers in 2026

Sitting in the conference room of his office in Bengaluru, Ather co-founder and chief Tarun Mehta is amused at a question on how life has changed since the company went public. The bespectacled 36-year-old says he is frequently asked this, nearly everywhere he goes.

“I'm getting a bit of a fomo (fear of missing out) right now. There's something I'm missing about what should have changed. I almost feel obliged to say that something has changed, but I can't, hand on heart, say what's changed," Mehta says with a smile.

“For me, personally, not much," he told Mint in an hour-long chat at Ather’s headquarters in the tech capital of the country.

Yet, the image of his company in the eyes of investors, the public, and the media has undoubtedly changed. Known as the slow-and-steady manufacturing startup, pitted against the juggernaut of Bhavish Aggarwal, many wondered whether Ather would ever step out of Ola Electric Ltd's shadow.

Those doubts were laid to rest this year. In the July to September quarter of 2025, Ather crossed Ola Electric in total market capitalization, total sales (over 65,000 versus 52,000 for Ola), and revenue ( ₹899 crore versus Ola’s ₹690 crore).

Investors have shown faith. Since going public in May, the company’s shares have more than doubled, up more than 130%, compared with a 22% rise in the Nifty Auto index.

Ather’s core strategy

Mehta attributes all this to fundamental business principles.

“I'm not going to give you a big revelation here. It's a pretty obvious answer, Business 101. You double down on your strengths. We are where we are, to whatever degree, because of differentiation. No business can survive without differentiation," Mehta said in response to a question on what will be the company’s roadmap for the next few months.

Ather counts its product engineering and technology edge as its strengths. The company's sales growth is coming from two sources: its Ather Rizta scooter and its expanding distribution network. By the end of this financial year, the company will have 700 stores and will have expanded beyond its strongholds in southern India.

The company is working on its next phase of growth through the EL platform, which will be manufactured at its new plant in Chattrapati Sambhaji Nagar, the new name of Aurangabad, next year.

Ather’s rise contrasts with the fortunes of Ola Electric, which once dominated the electric scooter market with a 50% share, but was relegated to fifth position by sales in November. Ola’s troubles stem from its service network failing to cope with huge volumes.

But according to Ather’s Mehta, the market misunderstands the question of service and confuses it with the number of centres.

“If your service centres are full, generally the issue won't be, at least in the same city where you don't have enough capacity. Generally, it points to a fundamental issue with the vehicle. A good vehicle ought to need far fewer instances of service," Mehta said.

Ather’s focus is on ensuring its products require less servicing, according to Mehta. And even if they do, the company ensures that the dealer network has a service centre where company-trained personnel are assigned. Ather also conducts regular audits of its network to ensure that service centres are staffed adequately. That’s also a reason why the company is selective in opening new dealerships.

“We have tens of thousands of dealer applications. We keep refusing cities and I personally approve every single store that opens every other month. Not a single store opens without my explicit approval," Mehta says. “I don't mean I get a bulk file that says approve, and I type approve yes. It's typically a three-day meeting where we go through every single detail."

But as the company grows, will the founder be able to maintain such a hands-on approach? Mehta says he and his team have already found a solution to make decisions faster and better, ensuring he and co-founder Swapnil Jain can continue to maintain a hands-on approach.

“The way we've always solved this is by coming up with better and better analytics and coming up with better and better ways to cut and slice data and automate understanding using data so that decision making just keeps getting faster," Mehta said.

Legacy players are the real threat now

While Ather has managed to beat its crosstown rival Ola Electric for now, its bigger challenge now lies in competing with TVS Motor Co. and Bajaj Auto Ltd, the legacy two-wheeler makers who have now raced ahead on EV charts. Ather’s success will now be measured by how effectively it can chip away at the market from the top two.

As of November, TVS Motor held 26% market share, Bajaj Auto 22%, Ather Energy 17%, Hero MotorCorp 12% and Ola Electric 7%.

"Slow and steady can win the race," said Subhabrata Sengupta, partner at Avalon Consulting, highlighting Ather’s strategy. “Solid work in technology, robust testing of products, getting basics right before scale up has helped them," Sengupta said. “They have done well but now are in danger of being outrun as ICE (internal combustion engine) incumbents get their act together."

With decades of experience and deep penetration in the Indian market, legacy players can quickly scale up EV sales. Moreover, as the EV business remains unprofitable for now, it is easier for the incumbents to reinvest profits of their ICE business to get incremental growth in EV market, which can help them be more aggressive in spending on growth.

Ather, which counts Hero MotoCorp Ltd, India’s largest two-wheeler maker, as its single largest shareholder, isn’t too worried about competing with the legacy players.

“Do legacy companies get product and tech first or would we, as a new player, get distribution first? Because that obviously is our weakness," he said, adding that the company will continue to grow as it goes deeper and wider across India with its expansion an ongoing process.

But as Ather expands across the country and adds new customers, Mehta admits that one thing has changed: the time he gets to spend regularly interacting with customers. To compensate, he says he loves scrolling through social media comments, even pointing out stores or service centres where things aren't going right based on customer posts.

“Every time between meetings, I would just basically keep reading what people are saying online…I don't feel panicky that I don't know what people are saying," he said.

“But the meeting is nicer. The meeting is just nicer," he said, referring to interactions with customers. “Yeah, I do miss that."