August 15, 2021, the 75th Independence Day of India witnessed the commercial launch of Ola Electric’s much-anticipated electric scooters, the Ola S1 and S1 Pro, starting at ₹99, 999 (including FAME II subsidies and excluding state government incentives, registration fee, and insurance cost), and ₹1,29,999 for the Pro model. The final price will vary according to subsidies offered by each state government, the company said.
If you, like me, are interested in buying one of the models, you can start purchasing from September 8. The first deliveries will start sometime in October across 1,000 cities and towns in India, and exports to countries in Asia, Latin America and Europe will begin in the coming months. Ola has already received over one lakh pre-bookings for its scooter in the first 24 hours of opening bookings to the public.
For now, the company plans to begin an initial production run of one million scooters in the coming months.
Ride-hailing leader and electric vehicle manufacturer Ola had announced earlier that the electric scooters would be launched on August 15, and it has delivered. Focussing on a trendy design, high speed, battery range, and insurance cost, Ola’s maiden electric scooters are the most feature-rich electric two-wheelers in the country. According to Ola, the electric scooters are designed and engineered in India for the world and are set to deliver the best scooter experience to the consumer, while promising higher performance and greater range than its rivals.
Describing the scooters as industry-leading products with the best in class range, speed, and cost, Ola Electric CEO Bhavish Aggarwal said that it was the best scooter ever made, not just the best electric scooter. “We have to make technology which is the best in the world and that’s what we’re doing. We’ve been saying we’ll build our own technology. We built our own technology. All of this has been done by Indian teams based here in this office, and it’s world-leading,” Aggarwal said.
Coming to the specifications of the e-scooters, the Ola S1 Pro will have a 3.97 kilowatt-hour (KwH) battery pack that is rated for a range of 181 km and will have a top speed of 115 kmph. The S1will have a 2.98 kWh battery pack and will have a top speed of 90 km/h. They will be equipped with modern features such as WiFi, 4G, and Bluetooth connectivity, keyless start, voice control, widgets, hill hold, reverse parking mode, disk brakes on both tires, and cruise control that activates at 40kmph, and navigation. The larger boot space can accommodate two helmets. On one full charge, you can travel 121km with a peak power of 8.5kw on the Ola S1. The numbers are increased to 181 km with a peak power of 8.5kw when it comes to the Ola S1 Pro.
They also sport a 7-inch touch display that is powered by an octa-core processor and 3GB of RAM along with the company’s MoveOS and includes proximity sensors that can sense when the rider is approaching them and turn themselves on automatically. The rider can also change the theme of the dashboard and sound and play music. Additionally, the rider can create separate user profiles for different riders.
The color options of the Ola S1 are white, yellow, red, black, and sky blue (or teal), while the Ola S1 Pro comes in 10 colors – yellow, pink, and three shades of black and dark grey, and the five colors of the Ola S1 Pro.
The two models seem to have lived up to the hype and will be the key to fulfilling Aggarwal’s vision of a 100% switch to EV two-wheelers by 2025, with the country having the ability to capture 50% of the global two-wheeler demand by that time.
