A start-up reimagining e-bikes

Office of Ather Energy, a startup hatched in IIT --
The Madras Research Park in Taramani embodies the spirit of young and restless workers: darts in a corner are badly injured;
There was a mess of papers in almost all the compartments;
Suddenly, many people crowded together;
Some employees even threw away their wallets.
At the entrance, one can almost miss the prototype electronics
The team has been working on bicycles for more than a year.
The team of 17 engineers did not lack strength when trying to redesign
Imagine an electric bike under Indian conditions.
Founder Tarun Mehta and swabin Jaen are both alumni of IIT
Madras\'s engineering and design department and their team are currently at the height of getting $1 million in seed funding from Flipkart\'s founders, Gavin Bansal and Binny Bansal.
\"Our intention is to build a zero-compromise electric bike that competes with the best gasoline scooters on the market,\" said Tarun Mehta . \".
\"The electric scooters sold here so far are all small and sold in space between a cycle and a low cycleEnd of motor cycle.
But we believe there is a market for a truly well-designed product. ”Prof. R.
Krishna Kumar of IIT engineering design-
Madras, who has coached Ather Energy, said the startup\'s ambition is unique.
\"They don\'t just assemble electric bikes with ready-made components.
This is a systematic attempt to create a product through rigorous mathematical modeling.
They are looking at every important component from the battery management system to \"ride comfort\" to handling.
\"The big change is one of the biggest changes batterythe team has brought to electric scooters is the battery pack.
So far, most electric scooters on the market have used lead
Acid battery, the team at Ather Energy is trying to use lithium ion batteries that are common in laptops.
(The founder has applied for a patent for a new lithium-ion battery pack.
) There used to be a company that used lithium-ion batteries in the Indian market, but they have imported battery packs.
Ather plans to assemble battery packs in India.
Ather\'s efforts were made at a time when electric scooter sales fell in the country.
The number of electric scooters sold in the country dropped from nearly 1 in 2009 to 20,000 last year.
Both Tarun and Swapnil see this as a huge opportunity.
\"We did a study on the cause of the failure of the electric scooter before launching the athher Energy.
We met people who bought electric scooters and asked them what was the biggest grouse in this car.
Most of them say the battery pack is faulty and they complain about performance as well.
No one wants to ride a motorcycle in front of a traffic light and then watch other vehicles whizzing through.
Here we propose a proposition for a powerful vehicle, good pickup, shorter charging time and better comfort.
We have 25 preliminaries.
Orders and Rs.
The six lakhs we received were the start of our company, \"25-year-old Tarun says.
Tarun and Swapnil from IIT-
Madras, only six months after going online, resigned from work at different car companies in March 2013, and Ather Energy officially hatched at IIT --
M research park in November of that year
In February, they received the first round of funding from the technology development committee and another IIT alumni and the founder of Aerospike Srini V. Srinivasan. Another Chennai
The term sheet, which is based on startups, provides startups with standardized legal documents for seed round financing, helping Ather to quickly obtain transactions with banks.
Moved to BangaloreThe Ather team, which has so far taken advantage of the ecosystem that Chennai has provided in relation to the prototype building or the rich automotive spare parts heritage
Soon, the parts manufacturing industry will be transferred to a larger office in Bangalore.
A small team will still be working in Chennai, but Tarun says closer to Hosur\'s motorcycle manufacturing center will help roll out their Electronics
Bike at the end of 2015 or the first half of 2016.
For now, those who are interested in feeling their own energy trends can log in to www. atherenergy.
And sign up for the trial ride.
The team plans to get a new test run prototype of them in the next few months.