Kabhi kabhi jeetne ke liye kuch haarna bhi padta hai … aur haar kar jeetne waale ko baazigar kehte hai
- For Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain, nothing but this could be their best response to their IPO expected this year, as they have had to put a brave face in the midst of a recession, declining market share, reduced valuation and mounting losses.
New Delhi: Ather Energy has been one of the poster boys in the Indian startup scene- though not as popular as Bhavish Agarwal’s Ola Electric. It had a headstart in the 2-wheeler EV space, its S340 scooter launched in 2016 way before Bhavish had even founded Ola Electric in 2020.
Even though Ola’s scooters enjoyed their lead after the pandemic, Ather’s scooters were relatively unaffected by the spontaneous fires reported across the country for Ola and other e-scooters.
Ather Motors has remained far below the public radar for quite some time now, eclipsed by Bhavish Agarwal’s larger-than-life publicity campaign for his Ola scooters. Even today, Ola remains the top selling e-scooter brand in India, with Ather Energy being left behind at 4th place behind TVS and Bajaj Motors.
What seems to have gone wrong?
Ather Energy had a promising start- Both Tarun and Swapnil are IIT alumni and had the backing from leading investors like Hero MotoCorp and Flipkart founders Sachin and Binny Bansal. Unlike Bhavish Agarwal, who got his designs ready by buying a struggling e-scooter startup in the Netherlands, Ather’s team did most of the designing and manufacturing themselves.
Ola launched its first e-scooter a good 5 years later than Ather did, but it couldn’t match Bhavish’s targeted marketing campaign-highly inspired by Elon Musk’s for Tesla’s EVs- helping it become the top e-scooter seller in the country.
To be fair, Ather did aggressively expand across the country to compete with Ola, but it somehow didn’t get its marketing right the way it should.
Even as people initially praised Ola’s scooters for its sleek and minimalist design, the barrage of complaints about its limited range and frequent breakdowns earned the company a bad name.
Fortunately, Ather didn’t face such problems, but they also didn’t use this as an opportunity to boost its sales, even as its electric scooters’ pricing became almost at par with petrol ones.
Even though Ather’s scooters are seen as more reliable than Ola’s, they haven’t been able to crack the market highlighting their superior products from the rest.
This explains why legacy brands like Bajaj’s Chetak have done better than Ather’s Rizta.
Add the slowing demand due to the recession, lowering disposable incomes and a general sense of pessimism for income growth, Swapnil and Tarun now have to work harder to convince potential investors and buyers to invest in their vision.
What could (still) work for Ather?
Even though the market is looking bleak with very limited scope for growth, Swapnil and Tarun can still bank on Ather’s innovative design and features to stand out. They may have lost in the short term, but they can turn the tables for themselves and prove that Ather is the true ‘Baazigar’ in the ultra-competitive EV space. Even as customer complaints mount for Ola and Bajaj and TVS move in to capture its space, Ather has an opportunity that it cannot miss. How would they turn the tide on Bhavish’s clever PR or the reputation of Bajaj and TVS remains to be seen.
