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 "Luna")
Picture of iconic two-wheeler Luna’s old model (File Pic)
Kinetic on Wednesday relaunched the iconic two-wheeler Luna, after more than two decades, in an electric avatar with an aim to address the demand for affordable electric vehicles.
Motwani said that the current top 10 electric two-wheelers in the country are priced between Rs 1.05 lakh and Rs 1.49 lakh, which makes them a “luxury” that is not “practical and accessible” to most people in India.
She said that while Luna was a moped, e-Luna cannot be classified as a moped as it does not have pedals. “It is a multi-utility electric two-wheeler. While it is born from its predecessor, it is a result of nostalgia plus innovation,” she mentioned. E-Luna has a 2 kWh lithium-ion battery pack that delivers a range of 110 km on a single charge.
Luna was launched in 1972 and it went out of production in 2000. Currently, about 50,000 mopeds are sold in India per month with TVS leading the market with its XL100. However, XL100 is an internal combustion engine-run vehicle that is available at a starting ex-showroom price of Rs 44,999.
Gadkari said that the poor people, the ones living in slums, working on roads and in hair salons, working as cleaners, would see the launch of e-Luna as a boon. He also commended the quality and sturdiness of the vehicle.
Motwani said the company has already partnered with multiple electric vehicle financiers as well as small finance banks to ensure that e-Luna is available to customers at instalments of not more than Rs 2,000 per month.
She mentioned that a petrol-run two-wheeler costs on average Rs 6,000 per month (Rs 3,000 for monthly instalment plus Rs 3,000 for petrol) to a person. The E-Luna will cost a person less than Rs 2,500 (Rs 2,000 for monthly instalment and Rs 300 for electric charging cost).
She said that 70 per cent of India does not have any electric two-wheeler for its use as the ones currently available in the market have issues such as low-ground clearance, too much plastic and software, and high price.
Kinetic opened the bookings for E-Luna on January 26, and it has already received about 40,000 leads to book the vehicle. It has also received immense interest from the “B2B segment” — which includes e-commerce companies and last-mile mobility players — for delivery of 50,000 E-Lunas over the next 12 months, she mentioned.
Motwani, however, said that she expects that the customer base from the personal mobility market would be larger than in the B2B segment.
She said that Kinetic currently has 350 dealer showrooms, which will be increased to 500 by September. In the next two years, the company plans to have 1,000 showrooms. On top of this, the company plans to open E-Luna shops, which will be small showrooms in towns or rural areas.
The company would also be launching three other variants of e-Luna, two of them would have different batteries. One would give a range of about 80 km per charge while the other one would give a range of about 150 km per charge.
Kinetic currently has a production capacity of 500,000 units per month, she said, adding that the company plans to sell 100,000 units by March next year.
First Published: Feb 07 2024 | 9:17 PM IST
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