Ather Energy to double stores, expand scooter line-up on new platform
With a push towards cost efficiency, premium product positioning, and a target of crossing 20% market share, Ather is preparing to scale its footprint while staying clear of aggressive discounting.
Ather Energy shares closed at ₹489.30 on the NSE as of 3:30 PM on September 01
This is the edited excerpt of the interview.
Q: What are some of the big product launches that are lined up next that investors in your company, generally enthusiast about bikes should watch out for from Ather?
A: We just announced today that we think the future is going to be several products. And we have just announced this new platform, the EL platform, that will go soon to and, on that platform, we think we can build a variety of different scooters. We just showed how maxi can be, how a commuter can be, a sports scooter can be? We think there’s a potential to build three, four different kind of more scooter products over the coming years.
Eventually, we also showcase a concept today, Redux, and I think that straddles that gap between scooters and motorcycles and bridges them beautifully. While we don’t have a launch date or any immediate commercialisation plan for it, but that kind of at least expresses intent of where we think we can go.
Motorcycles are there in the radar. We do think this is now the time to go deep and invest in the R&D for that platform, like how we have invested in the EL platform R&D, the new scooter platform R&D over the last two years. We think now is the time to invest in very deep motorcycle R&D. But I would say a natural product launch is at least one, maybe still two years away.
Read Here | Exclusive: Ather targets 700 stores by FY26, eyes 20% EV scooter market share
Q: As Ather, you have projected yourself as this premium market player, so to speak, in the EV space. With Rizta, some would call it a more mass-market product. Now with the launch of your EL platform, which you say will be more cost effective for the company should we expect a bit more push strategic shift towards a more mass-market segment?
A: It’s possible, certainly, we announced a lot of things on EL today that lowered the cost of the platform considerably. The lower the material cost, the lower the assembly cost, lower the servicing cost, and we are also going to produce this out of a much larger, integrated facility in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Aurangabad. So, all of that does help and create a situation where we can price our products more aggressively. Obviously, we are not announcing price today, and obviously we are not giving you a specific thing, but I will acknowledge that, EL does give us the ability to price products more aggressively.
Having said that, I will also say I don’t think the market is for products below a lakh.
Q: So, at ₹1 lakh is where you draw the line.
A: Today, our entry portfolio with software is somewhere around ₹1.2 lakh plus. So, there is a gap and I think there are amazing experiences we can build for our consumers there. But for us the Lakshmana Rekha still is ₹1 lakh. Because going below that, we are just leaving money on the table, and we are not putting together enough price to build a good experience for the end consumer. We never put out something that we are not proud of.
Q: The new range of scooters that do come out on the EL platform, will not go below
₹1 lakh?A: Lakshmana Rekha.
Q: The other big news from the Vahan data that we see, you have climbed up to the number two spot, just after TVS Motor and ahead of Ola, Bajaj Auto and Hero and the others. How confident you are of maintaining that kind of a lead, staying at that position, if not improving it further, especially given how some of your rivals do often resort to heavy discounting, something you haven’t done much of, to boost sales and have other advantages as well?
A: We have the opinion that margin is not our lever. We don’t play on margin. We don’t hence play on discounts. What we win and lose on are our products and the experiences we build for the consumers. We didn’t discount 450 to win market share. We built Rizta, a product that is fundamentally lower cost and can target a larger market. We will build the EL as a product that is even better cost structure. Will not just take Rizta and discount it by ₹10,000-20,000 to win market share.
I don’t think discounting is something you should expect us to do seriously. For us, we look at markets from a more fundamental perspective. How many consumers are there who would see value in what Ather is building and that’s a pie that keeps expanding, and that’s not because of what even we are doing, and that’s because of how the country is getting richer.
We believe India is going to keep premiumising because per capita income is just going up. It is one of the most secular things to bet on in India. And as people get richer, they will buy more premium products. We grew up in families where our parents had an Activa or a Splendor amazing, successful two wheelers. But now that we have grown up, we would want to buy something different.
Q: Talking about market share, you have gotten to number two, that’s a place you think you can maintain with a wider lead?
A: I don’t know. Somebody else could do something else on. It’s not my business to predict for others who do. I think my business, it is my job to do, to build great products, build them profitably and keep scaling them. I can’t tell you if in a quarter, somebody else is going to discount, or in another quarter, somebody else is going to shut down stores. What I can tell you is that there is a secular path where people buy more and more well-built products. We have a great roadmap for them, and we are not straying away. We are not suddenly switching and saying, what, let us just build this basic entry product that means nothing, but it will give us some more volume. That’s not who we are.
Q: Sure, you are not doing that, but your stated objective, at least in the near term, is to get to that 20% share. You are still at about 17%?
A: Tactically on that there are very good signs. Every market that we have gone deep in and that we have focused, for example, south, Gujarat, North East, Ather has become number one. These are three very different markets, if you think about it. South India, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, very different from Gujarat, very different from North East. In fact, there are towns after towns in even North India.
Our bet has been that good products can be built in any category. We will build them. We will build fantastic experiences, like we have gone a great lens, even with EL01 here today, to really build things that are not existing in the category today.
Q: So, 20%?
A: It is in the horizon. I would say that, because all these are the markets we have crossed 20% and more, 23%, 24%, 25%, 27%. So I think as a distribution expands in the rest of the country, getting to 20% plus is something we can certainly chase now.
Q: Big things to look forward to in FY26, whether that is margin improvement, any new launches, what are the key milestones?
A: We have been doing lot of work on gross margins, we have been doing lot of work on quality. With AtherStack there’s substantial work there’s now happen on software. We have launched two new variants of Rizta and 450 each, higher range variants. And ultimately, it’s more stores.
The story in FY26 for us is simply put, expanding distribution. We are going to take this business from 200 stores to 400 stores and eventually 700 stores through the course of this year. And that’s the biggest piece that anybody should track for us.
Also Read | Ather Energy unveils EL platform, voice tech and faster charging at Community Day
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