My name is Vivek Vidhyasagar, I am one
of the Founder and Director in this company and this specific project
YeLaundry. I am not an expert in writing blogs so unsure if the blog is going
to be entertaining but I will give my try to keep it informative on the topic
that I wanted to write about here "Why choose Electric Vehicles" and
a background about our thought process, evaluation methodologies, realistic
challenges that you will face so on and so forth. This is a personal opinion
and my own journey in this exercise.
We own 3 Electric vehicles (three-wheeler) in our fleet now
and are focussed to increase the same as we progress further in our Idea too.
If you ask why 3, 3-wheeler electric vehicles and not 2 or more or may be even
less. I am not going to say an astronomical definition for the reason to choose
3 it was just that we needed only these many vehicles to support us in our Beta
testing that was based on the locations that we had opted for in Pune, also the
availability of budget and being conservative provided the various challenges
that exists in the infrastructure availability for Electric vehicles.
Like I mentioned above, I will give a summary of my thoughts
and the process we adopted before we purchased our EV.
1. Why (How) did we choose Electric
Vehicles as a solution for our fleet management?
2. What were the various factors that we
discussed before choosing the vendor whom we opted for?
3. Conclusion – First Experience,
Benefits
Answer to Bullet point 1: The idea to leverage Electric vehicles as an option
was seeded at least about 6 months before by my friend, mentor who guides me
each day in both aspects of a human life tagged as personal and professional.
It is true it took us 6 months before we released our purchase order given the
reason of unable to determine a certain purchase check list that we might use
if we are purchasing a regular motor vehicle be it 2 or 4 wheeler; there were
more dis-advantages that exists in this solution, fairly competitors are also
more now even if not within Pune but as electric vehicle solution providers in
India. However, the person who seeded this thought had certain valuable points
that made me consider the reason to support this decision;
1. Value of our company and the project
– giving back to the society, necessity to support the mother Earth for the
future generations and also a responsible citizen / entrepreneur. It is a ZERO
Emission Vehicle
2. Vision of the Indian Government to
promote Electric Vehicles and the very reason that it is Pollution free and
need for the current global warming challenges that we are facing in our
country and also across the globe.
3. Forecasted Reduction in cost of
operations (like and not limited to only running cost, maintenance, reliability
etc.) for over a duration of about 8 to 14 months based on projected sales,
average distance to be covered for the logistical requirements in the project.
There are studies that says 50 paise or less than that for a KM.
P.S:
I personally do not know unless we use it for a while.
4. Disruption in the market by
leveraging such solutions for daily essential needs of human life; here
“Laundry” (solution is not new, but we purchased this even before Amazon had
advertised about electric vehicle fleet solution 😊)
5. Leverage this vehicle for increasing
awareness about the project and the company. I was convinced here that it was
worth an investment considering the cost for bill boards, hoardings and other
printed media marketing solutions that are currently available
6. There might be other points but this
is the FIVE that I can think of which helped me align to this thought
Answer to Bullet point 2: There are very limited or no companies today in the
Indian market that exists which manufactures their own products that are
required to manufacture an Electric Vehicle. I am not referring to the body or chassis
of the vehicle but the Brain and Heart that drives EV on the road.
After spending sufficient time trying to evaluate various
vehicles, I can summarise this into my own Acronym as DPATS means
Design, Procure, Assemble, Test and Sell. <<% of market share is
significantly less; you have a choice to run your own company if you have the
passion and necessary funds to drive it.>>
I might be wrong to say that there is no company but based on
the locations we tried to find a service provider which includes New Delhi,
Kolkata, Gujarat, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, Chennai and Coimbatore we were not
able to identify one vendor who doesn’t fall into this category of DPATS. There
is a difference in design, name of the vehicle, colour of the vehicle but the
fundamental parts required to run the vehicle like Battery (Lead Acid or
Lithium), Motor, Controller, Brakes which can be either Hydraulic Drum Brakes,
Hand Lever Rear Parking Brake or combination of both there is no difference.
I do not want to list the companies that we reviewed as it is
not about Advantages and Dis-advantages of a company but I will share the
factors that we considered before finalising the vendor;
1. Company – number of years in relevant
business, leadership, number of employees, value of the company (Revenue),
their locations for both sales and manufacturing
2. Design options like two-wheeler,
three-wheeler; then further classifications of vehicles within the same
3. Number of vehicles sold till date,
locations, customers to whom the vehicles were sold to help understand the end
user purpose
4. Reference information of customers;
we had a database of around 10 customers and randomly chose 3 or 4 vendors whom
we personally visited to seek inputs and also spoke to all of them over
telephone to understand advantages and dis-advantages.
5. Recognitions & Certifications;
which includes Design (E.G: ARAI, BIS, ICAT), Process customer so on and so
forth
6. After Market Strategy which includes
the methodology followed by them for servicing like number of free services,
days required for servicing, average service cost and additional facilities
available from OEM for the customer after sales
7. Pro Active Maintenance schedule to
increase the reliability of the vehicle and also reduce any possible break
down.
8. Test Drive of the vehicle; we also
drove customers vehicle and also the vehicles available from the supplier for
test drive. This is a very critical step in the selection process as it will
help you understand multiple things in this. I tried to evaluate on driving comfort
which includes sitting comfort, visibility from rider position in all 360
degrees (given the fact we are in India), road types - flat, slippery, steep,
greater than 40 degree inclination, with and without load, bumpy roads,
metallic body of the vehicle, possible options for rust, feel of the breaks,
feel of noise that can be caused like vibrations, tyre noise, motor, any other
noise that can be created either due to friction or environmental factors,
security for both vehicle, person riding it, other additional features. Don’t
be afraid to ask for another test drive if you’re still unsure and until you
are sure.
9. Warranty of critical parts in the
vehicle like battery, control unit, motor, electrical parts with wirings and any
other accessories
10. Battery – really understanding the
difference between Lead Acid and Lithium Ion; the one we purchased is equipped
with Lithium Ion Phosphate. Charging time, intelligence in charging if any
available (battery backup system) like automatic cut over once the batteries
are fully charged, maximum output like depth of discharge, efficiency, distance
it can travel, duration required for full charging and benefits in these two
different varieties
11. Engineering of the vehicle which
includes like braking system, electrical part, shock absorber systems, load
capacity, power etc.
12. Cost of the vehicle including
insurance, registration fees and anything else
13. Speed that the vehicle can travel
including its performance when vehicle is fully loaded and have to drive on a
steep road. RTO has a restriction of 25Kmph but I feel for purpose like this it
is good that there are speed restrictions.
There might be other points also for you to consider like
payment terms, delivery timelines etc. and any additional accessories that they
will provide like Electric Vehicle charging unit, power cable and so on. Above
are the points that I considered while evaluating this solution.
Answer to Bullet
point 3: with we have purchased our vehicles (photo shared in the blog for
your reference) we are just experiencing its benefits and challenges. Cost of
purchasing Lithium Ion batteries are minimum 30% more than the vehicle with
Lead Acid batteries; I will strongly recommend purchasing Lithium batteries as
except for cost other parameters like capacity, depth of discharge, efficiency,
lifespan these batteries are really beneficial. Also, in our operations we do
not have dedicated resources to manage the vehicles and will be in the hands of
riders who will be working with us in this project.
Benefits:
1. Low Operating Cost compared to even
CNG or Petroleum products and also from our business perspective also this
solution is very beneficial when the fleet management is in the responsibility
of my company.
2. Easy Charging – not more than 3 hours
to fully charge the vehicle and drive minimum of 80 Km to 90 Km
3. Leveraging this vehicle for our
marketing purpose; we are currently driving an average of around 3 hours in
multiple places in Pune trying to help understand our business and purpose to
the customers and create an awareness. In Pune average cost for hoarding for a
month is around Rs. 30,000 to 1,00,000 and other printed media advertisements
like lolly pop is like INR 2000 per month per print. In a city like Pune we may
need like more than 10000 such posters to get some awareness
4. Battery Technology like almost Zero
maintenance, lithium-ion battery for up to 3 years of life.
5. Attraction for the vary purpose that
I had explained earlier in the for reason of choosing EV and also marketing
expenses
6. There are other benefits too which is
more for our business and is not necessarily need to be same for you.
Constraints: (The Perfect Storm!!!)
1. Parking space – it is a fixed cost
that has to be incurred if there is no secured place available. We are having 3
vehicles now in our fleet but it is a fixed cost and will increase as we
increase
2. Safety of the vehicle – because there
are no doors and is practically impossible to put doors as it increases the
weight of the vehicle too. Safe guarding accessories like horn, reverse parking
system, switches etc. While we have put adequate locks and installed additional
fabrication to protect the control unit, batteries etc. they are always at risk
of theft that will almost make you spend 80% of the vehicle cost to replace
them if there are any issues like this
3. No infrastructure available for
charging other than your designated parking spaces which puts your business in
threat if you are thinking of using these vehicles for deliveries or any
logistic requirements.
4. Brakes – Hydraulic brakes; as you
know it works on the concept of pascal law there is always a possibility of
leakage, that can cause the braking be compromised
5. Leaf Spring suspension with
telescopic shocker however it is not still adequate. The rear wheels have to be
in synchronisation when driving on rough roads to maintain vehicle balance
6. Risk of any failure, theft and
external environments of critical components as there are no substitute or
cheaper solutions that will increase your expenses.
While there are constraints in this solution, we have a long
way to go in nearing 100% perfect product that will be more reliable and robust
it is still worth the journey 😊
Thank You, Vivek