Ather Energy was founded in 2013 by Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain. In early 2014, it received from the Technology Development Board under Department of Science and Technology, IIT Madras and Srini V Srinivasan, IIT alumnus and founder of Aerospike. In December 2014, Flipkart founders, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal invested $1 million as the seed capital. Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal expressed a positive sentiment towards the company and showed inclination towards energy-efficient vehicles. In May 2015, it received $12 million from Tiger Global for investments in development, testing, production and the launch of the vehicle. On 23 February 2016, the company unveiled its smart scooter S340 at a technology conference Surge in Bangalore. Hero MotoCorp invested in the Series B round of funding in October 2016 and gained a 32.31% stake in the company. It invested again in 2018 to the tune of. In May 2019 Ather Energy raised an investment of $51 million in its latest round of funding, led by Sachin Bansal’s investment of $32 million. Ather Energy was one of the earliest start-up investments of Sachin Bansal when he invested $0.5 million in the firm as an Angel investor in 2014. Hero MotoCorp has converted its Convertible Debt of $19 million as a part of this round. In addition to this, InnoVen Capital has extended an $8 million venture debt. In December 2019, Ather Energy signed a MoU with Government of Tamil Nadu to set up a manufacturing plant for electrical vehicles in Hosur. The invested amount will be around
Production and sale
The company has announced an online-only purchase model for selling the product with doorstep service. It set up its manufacturing unit in Whitefield, Bangalore which commenced production in 2018 with capacity of 600 vehicles per week. The company has disclosed the price of the Ather 450 to be. It also establishes Ather Grid, an electric vehicle charging infrastructure in cities it is present in. The company has set up over 31 fast charging points in Bengaluru and 10 charging points in Chennai as of July 2019.
Ather 450
The Ather 450 is constructed using an all-aluminium frame, comes with a 5.4 kW Brushless DC electric motor, and a 2.4 kWh lithium-ion battery pack. The scooter can accelerate to 40 km/h in 3.9 seconds, attain a top speed of 80 km/h, and can travel 75 km on one charge in city-riding conditions. The scooter features a 7-inch touchscreen dashboard, and comes with features like on-board navigation, diagnostics, all-LED lighting, auto-cancelling indicators, smartphone integration, and cloud connectivity to send and receive data from Ather's servers.
Ather Grid
Ather has set up its own charging network, dubbed Ather Grid, in Bangalore & Chennai. These DC-fast-charging stations use Ather's proprietary charging method and connector to charge the Ather scooters at a rate of 1 km/min. The charging points are also equipped with a 3-pin socket to supply AC power to other electric vehicles that do not use Ather's connector. Other vehicle can connect to the charging point and start charging using the Ather Grid app for iOS and Android. Ather has plans to set up around 60 points in Bangalore & Chennai, and set up more Ather Grid in other cities as it expands. Ather also sets up a home charging point at customer's homes which will charge the Ather 450 to 80% in 2 hours 40 minutes and to 100% in 4 hours 18 minutes.
Ather Space
Unlike most auto manufacturers in India, Ather Energy owns and operates its own Experience Centers. The company claims that this helps in maintaining end-to-end customer experience. The Experience Centers, dubbed AtherSpace, are aimed at increasing product understanding, providing customer education, and giving a first-hand experience of the product to consumers. Test rides are also provided at the Experience Centers and can be pre-booked on the company's website. Experience Centers have components of the scooter displayed with useful information provided alongside each of them. There is also a fully built naked scooter on display to show the chassis of the scooter. Ather currently has two Experience centers in India - One at 100-ft road Indiranagar, Bangalore and another one at Nungambakkam, Chennai.
