Hero MotoCorp to bump up presence of VIDA V1 e-scooter to 100 cities

Hero MotoCorp on Wednesday said it will scale up the presence of its electric scooter range under the VIDA brand to 100 cities this year.

The company, which also announced a cut of around Rs 20,000 in the prices of VIDA V1 Plus and VIDA V1 Pro scooters, said it will utilise its existing dealer network to rapidly scale up electric vehicle operations across the country.

"In line with our vision to democratise green mobility and expedite the growth of the electric vehicle (EV) category, we are set for a rapid expansion of VIDA across the country," Hero MotoCorp Head Emerging Mobility Business Unit Swadesh Srivastava said in a regulatory filing.

The company will utilise the existing network strength of Hero MotoCorp to expand operations to 100 cities, he added.

It has already commenced the expansion plan with eight new cities Pune, Ahmedabad, Nagpur, Nasik, Hyderabad, Chennai, Calicut and Kochi.

VIDA brand is currently present in Bengaluru, Jaipur, and Delhi aided by nearly 300 charging points at 50 locations.

Hero MotoCorp said the expansion plans for the VIDA brand will be supported through new pricing for the VIDA V1.

The VIDA V1 Plus and VIDA V1 Pro will now cost Rs 1,19,900 and Rs 1,39,900 respectively (ex-showroom price pan-India, including portable charger and FAME II subsidy), it added.

The new prices of the two scooter trims, however, will vary across the country based on respective state subsidies.

"We are confident that our new price points will bring more customers into the EV scooter category... aligned with our customer-centric ethos, we will also extend the pricing benefit to the existing VIDA V1 customers," Srivastava said.

Hero MotoCorp introduced the VIDA V1 scooter in October 2022 and customer deliveries began in December of the same year.

The company has been a late entrant into the segment which has players like Ola Electric, Ather, TVS Motor and Bajaj.