Hero Electric's 3-wheeler may cost Rs 90,000

After joining the electric two-wheeler club with its new moped and scooter range, Hero Electric, which has been conducting trial runs of a three-wheeler prototype in Delhi has decided to give it a further 15-month testing period before submitting the vehicle to the Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI) since its speed is over 25 km per hour.

The proposed three-wheeler weighs 600 kg with a deadweight of around 850 kg. Present tests have put its charging capacity at 120 km per charge and is able to speed close to 30-35 kms. Although the price of the vehicle hasnt been decided yet, it is working out to be close to Rs 90,000.

Technology for the three-wheeler has come from Ultra Motor Company (UMC), a UK-based Electric Vehicle (EV) Solutions provider, who in collaboration with Hero Cycles have developed the electric two-wheeler in India.

UMC has extensively worked on three-wheeler electric vehicles, wheelchairs among other products through its R&D lab in Moscow and has used hub-mounted brushed motors for the product. Being hub-mounted, the vehicle is expected to be more durable and provide a significant increase in torque.

"Three-wheelers are a natural progression after the introduction of electric two-wheelers. Our efforts for the moment are to take the two-wheelers across India for which the first phase of the rollout started in North India, moved to Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Western Uttar Pradesh and has now entered Gujarat," said Vijay Munjal, Managing Director, International Marketing, Hero Cycles. In the next phase, the company will look at Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and Orissa.

He also said that the company is enthusiastic about the sales of the vehicles on the basis of an AC Nielsen study which says there will be a market for 2 lakh electric vehicles in 2007-08 and a further 5 lakh units in 2008-09.

Presently, the two-wheelers are made with a component localisation of 25 per cent.

But plans are afloat to increase localisation by possibly sourcing plastics within the country instead of importing it from China. The next few months will see the production capacity at the company's manufacturing plant in Ludhiana increase from 5,000 units to 8,000 units per month.

Hero Electric had also revealed that it has begun receiving dealership interests from Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and other nearby countries but a decision on exports has not been taken yet.

Hero Cycles, the parent company, has exported Rs 200 crore worth cycles of different ranges to Europe, US, Africa, Latin America, Japan among other countries for 2006-07.