Bajaj Urbanite launch has been confirmed by Rajiv Bajaj and ‘soon’ is the latest word he has penned…
Bajaj has been making news ever since they partnered with UK’s Triumph motorcycles to develop new mid-capacity bikes for the domestic and international markets. This has opened up tremendous opportunities for both the players to capture new sets of customers. However, that is a part of a larger discussion and may take some time.
It is already known that Bajaj has lined up an all-new brand ‘Urabnite‘ which will mark the company’s venture into the world of electric vehicles. While unveiling the brand’s new identity ‘The World’s Favourite Indian‘, Rajiv Bajaj also talked about Urbanite and said that it is coming soon..
“Most of you are here with the expectation that electric scooter is going to appear on stage. I am sorry to disappoint you that’s not going to happen today! But it will happen soon…”
This also, kind of, reveals that the first electric vehicle rolling out from Bajaj’s stables could be an e-scooter. Rajiv Bajaj has also, time and again, cleared that they will not make conventional petrol-powered scooters.
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Here are a few developments on this front…
- A separate business unit dedicated to the electric vehicle division called as UBU (Urbanite Business Unit) has been created. It is in addition to the existing MBU (Motorcycle Business Unit), IBU (intra-city business unit), EBU (export business unit) and PBU (Probiking Business Unit) divisions.
- Mr Sumeet Narang heads the newly constructed business unit and he is the person responsible for spearheading Bajaj’s foray into the world of e-vehicles. He will be helped by Amit Nandi (head of Probiking unit) for the financial year 2019.
Moreover, according to Money Control, Rajeev Bajaj said that they are working very strongly on electric two-wheelers. He said that the focus is more on the aesthetics of the product. He elaborated..
People are not buying Tesla because of its batteries, they buy because it is beautiful. So our way to approach electric mobility is not to make a battery on two-wheels (but) it is to make the most beautiful two-wheeler in the world
In a recent interview to Forbes, Rajiv Bajaj yet again talked about Tesla and this is what he said –
When we develop an electric two-wheeler, whether bikes or scooters or mopeds or bicycles, it will be a Tesla-like business. This brand will be purely electric. The best solution is when the brand itself is electric. Toyota is not an electric brand. It’s a petrol, diesel brand also making electric vehicles. But with Tesla, it’s not the case. You would be aghast if tomorrow Tesla launches a petrol Tesla.
So, Urbanite will be an electric vehicle brand which will sell stylish and aspirational products in the domestic as well as international markets.
The idea is to make a Tesla of two-wheeler EV space. It must be noted that arch-rival Hero is already in the electric two-wheeler space for the last many years. However, they are making only the very basic two-wheelers for now and Bajaj’s EVs are expected to be more dapper.
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Bajaj Urbanite Launch
Last year Bajaj said that they were targeting ‘next year and a half‘ to put the first Urbanite, likely to be a two-wheeler, in the market. And with the latest word from the MD himself, expect it to be the talking point sometime this year.
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Clearly, Mr Bajaj has identified more powerful motorcycles or niche segments as new business opportunities and he is already taking giant strides. For an update on Bajaj-Triumph’s motorcycles, click here.
