These entrepreneurs are turning their fleet into e-scooters after Covid hit

Bounce has crossed six million km on its electric scooters fleet, using a network of kirana owners, who have enabled over 150,000 battery swaps

A few months before the coronavirus pandemic outbreak, Bounce had become the world's fastest-growing bike-sharing firm, doing 120,000 rides per day. Last January, the Bengaluru-based firm’s valuation crossed $500 million after it raised $105 million in funding from investors such as Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin's B Capital and Accel Partners. It was scaling on par with global players, including US-based scooter-rental companies Lime and Bird. It had plans to expand in the country and also get into markets abroad.

However, the Covid-19 pandemic pounded the mobility industry. There was an impact on Bounce expansion plans. It had to lay off employees. The co-founders Vivekananda Hallekere, Varun Agni and Anil G, who founded the firm in 2014, took a 100 per cent pay cut. But now the company has rebounded. It adopted a strategy where it transformed itself as an electric scooter sharing player. This comes at a time when EV penetration is drastically going up amid the pandemic.

“We have been spending a lot of our time building capabilities around EVs,” said Vivekananda Hallekere, CEO and co-founder, Bounce. “That is the biggest thing we have done during the lockdown.”

This bold move has paid off. Bounce recently reached a significant milestone, crossing 6 million km on its electric vehicle fleet in over 15 months. This milestone was achieved with a wide network of kirana owners, who have now enabled over 150,000 battery swaps. Bounce currently owns one of the largest high-speed EV fleets in the country. The company is operating thousands of scooters, with over 50 per cent being EVs.

“Now we are working on converting our whole fleet into Evs,” said Hallekere.

This includes retrofitting existing ICE (internal combustion engine scooters) into EVs. It is working with the government so that the retrofit scooters can also get subsidies and other benefits. 

The total number of Bounce EV trips is now over one million. Though the business is recovering, Bounce is expecting to witness huge demand for the service once employees and students, which are major users, start going to offices and education institutes once again. The target is to do 100,000 rides per day.

However, the firm is also tapping into new users and segments, where it is already seeing an increasing demand amid the pandemic. The company is in talks with e-commerce companies such as Amazon and Flipkart to provide electric vehicles as part of their delivery fleet. 

Amazon has committed to include 10,000 EVs as part of its delivery fleet by 2025 in India.  

Flipkart will deploy more than 25,000 electric vehicles by 2030. This is in line with Walmart owned firm’s public commitment to transition to electric vehicles across its city logistics fleet.

Another big opportunity that Bounce is betting on is that it is also scaling up its battery swapping infrastructure. The company plans to open it up to everyone which includes businesses like Amazon and Flipkart for their delivery fleet as well as consumers using various brands of EVs. Battery swapping is a process in which a drained battery is exchanged for a fully charged battery at a battery swapping station. A mobile app would help the users to locate the nearest battery, see the amount of charge and swap it.

“We can take it across India,” said Hallekere.

Bounce has already set up battery swapping stations, under its subsidiary Zuink to power the electric transition of its vehicles across Bengaluru, Mysuru and Vijaywada. The company says it is a low cost, high density swapping infrastructure. Zuink is also able to cater to demand from B2B, B2C and other fleet operators. The entire swap process is automated, driven by the Internet of Things (IoT) technology. This ensures streamlined operations along with superior customer experience. The battery swapping stations are well distributed across the city. A swapping station is available within 1 -2 km from wherever the user is riding. 

The efforts of building swapping infrastructure by Bounce had started from early 2019. But it is not the only player doing it. In April, Ola Electric revealed its plans to set up the world’s largest electric two-wheeler charging network. SoftBank-backed Ola Electric plans to provide charging solutions to all its electric two-wheeler customers. It unveiled the Ola Hypercharger Network, the charging network for its upcoming two-wheeler products starting with the Ola Scooter to be launched in the coming months. However this charging network won’t be available to other electric vehicle players and only the customers of Ola Electric.

Also, Chetan Maini’s Sun Mobility, a leading provider of electric mobility solutions and services, has plans to set up 100 battery swapping stations for EVs in Bengaluru by the end of 2021.

Over 350 Kirana stores across Bengaluru have partnered with Bounce to set up battery swapping stations. Bounce has enabled these local business owners with an additional source of income within their cities and towns. They manage the operations at the station, in addition to their local business.

Bounce operates in Bengaluru and tier-2 markets such as Hassan, Mysuru, Vijayawada. The company is looking to expand to other cities as well. Bounce vehicles have moved from being a convenient option for office goers and students to an all-purpose vehicle for everyone, attracting a much wider cross-section of mobility seekers. Besides being affordable and convenient, the firm said these scooters are much safer than other available options. All bikes are sanitized, following the necessary safety protocols.

Through EV rides so far, Bounce has saved approximately 1,68,000 kgs of CO2 emissions, equivalent to planting 2,500 trees. The company aims to address the ever-growing commute requirement in a green, sustainable and climate-friendly manner. It is looking at making all its rides carbon neutral by 2022.

“We want to see ourselves as enablers of electric vehicles,” said Hallekere. “We will do everything to make adoption of EVs happen.”