Internal Updates

Hey Everyone!

Some of you must be wondering why we haven’t opened up your payment window. So, we just wanted to let you know that our end-of-line quality folks have detected an issue and vehicle deliveries have been halted for now. We will resume deliveries in about 7-10 days. Seems like the delivery timelines for some customers in Bengaluru and Chennai might shift a little - the same has been communicated to this bunch via email. We are trying to resolve this soon so that we can resume deliveries as early as possible.

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Hey Everyone!

We launched the Ather 450 and Ather 340 last year. However, most of our customers have preferred to own an Ather 450 for its great product offering - maximum specifications, maximum performance and an exhilarating ride experience.

A year & 3 months later and after launching in two markets, Ather 340 contributes barely 2% to our orders in Bengaluru and less than 1% in Chennai. This is a clear reaffirmation of our belief that our customers value super experience. Additionally, with a GST reduction from 12% to 5% on electric vehicles and an increased FAME 2 subsidy of Rs. 27,000, the Ather 450 is an even more attractive proposition.


Considering the comparatively low demand for 340 and a clear consumer preference for the Ather 450, we would like to reassign all our focus on Ather 450 and future products. The Ather 340 will be discontinued with immediate effect starting today.

All our future owners who have pre-ordered an Ather 340 will have the option to upgrade to the Ather 450 by paying the difference.

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Our deliveries have resumed!

The end-of-line quality issue that was observed last week and led to a brief halt in our production has been addressed and we are all set to resume deliveries. To begin with, we’ll prioritise the deliveries of those Bengaluru folks who’ve already made their full payments. Goes without saying that as the production ramps up, we plan to make up for the time we’ve lost. Stay tuned for more updates.

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Hey Everyone!

We have an upside on the charging time for the new Ather Dot! Over the last few weeks, we have been extensively testing the Ather Dot in real world conditions. The revised charging times for charging the vehicle with the Ather Dot are:

0-80% - 3 Hours 25 minutes
0-100% - 5 Hours 30 minutes

These times are based on charging at an ambient temperature of 25℃, and may marginally increase or decrease with the ambient temperature.

These specifications will also be updated on the website soon.

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Chennai Deliveries

Hey folks!

The first set of Ather 450s are all set to hit the roads of Chennai, with deliveries kicking off this Saturday! Over the next week, many more customers in Chennai will be getting their hands on a 450. Keep an eye out for the delivery information in your inbox :slight_smile:

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Ather Dot - the new home charger, now in Bengaluru!

Hey everyone!

Our new, lighter & easy-to-install home charger - Ather Dot, is now live in Bengaluru. All the folks who have made, or will be making, their full payment in October will get the Ather Dot. Know more about the Ather Dot below:

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Unfair fare affair :slight_smile:

Hey everyone, a few of you have expressed your disappointment on the need to pay for the Ather Dot installation charges. You are right. It’s totally unfair for you to pay extra because of a deviation at our end and it was never our intent to keep it that way. It was a miss and before we jumped in and said “we agree”, we wanted to make sure that we did the background work of updating the portal, communication, refunds etc.

Now that it’s taken care of, here’s the good news:

We are waiving off the installation charges for owners who were in the original Sep’19 batch in Bengaluru. All owners from this batch who’ve already paid, don’t worry. We’ll refund the amount.

Please note that If you fall in this batch and want to avail this waiver, you need to make the full payment before the end of your full-payment window timeline specified in the payment intimation mail. In case the payment is made after the closure of the original payment window as specified in the mail, the installation may be chargeable.

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Hey everyone!
We delivered the first batch of Ather 450s in Chennai, with a special delivery event at our Ather Space in Wallace Garden, Nungambakkam

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Mobile app update

A new version of the app (2.9.4) will be released shortly and will roll out on the Play Store and App Store in a day or two. It carries bug fixes and some minor user interface enhancements.

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There have been announcements by internet service providers about phasing out 3G technology, which has led to speculation and anxiety amongst our current and prospective customers. More specifically, however, our internet service provider Vodafone India has neither begun switching off 3G anywhere nor announced any timeline. We are in regular conversation with Vodafone, and are keeping a close eye on this. In any case, connectivity is an integral part of the Ather 450 experience, and to this end, we are committed to finding a solution before the sunset of 3G by Vodafone in India. We will keep you posted.

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We’ve noted that in exceptional cases, few of our owners have faced a problem of minor discoloration of the dashboard screen on very high exposure to sunlight.

As a proactive measure, we’ll fit a protective film on the screen of all the affected Ather 450s the next time they are up for periodic service.

Don’t worry, the cost is all on us :slightly_smiling_face: We would appreciate if you don’t raise a service request just for this. Also, the vehicles that will be delivered henceforth will not have this issue.

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Many of you have also voiced that communication needs to be improved between full payment and delivery. Starting with this batch, we’re piloting communicating your order status at major stages over email.

Here are the major stages when you’d get an email from us.

  1. Completion of full payment - Those who pay upfront, this is obvious enough, but if you’re under Loan/Lease, we’ll let you know when the financing partner approves and disburses the downpayment to us. Only after this will your Dot get dispatched and invoice & insurance processes start.
  2. Initiation of registration - This includes information about collecting Form 20 for Upfront/Loan customers, and then sending your application to the RTO. Post this, you can expect communication from the RTO through SMS. For those under Lease, Autovert takes care of this step.
  3. Completion of registration - Once your registration number has been allotted and intimated to us, we will prepare to get your vehicle delivered. This involves getting the HSRP printed, final quality checks, and scheduling your delivery.

The emails of course would have more information regarding the completed & next steps at each stage, so you know what’s going on till delivery. The timelines and processes for these would also vary slightly between upfront, loan and lease customers, and between Chennai and Bengaluru customers.

For queries on the status of your financing, reach out to them below:

Autovert customer care
076762 17677

Hero FinCorp
080-41270119

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Hello folks,

Happy new year to all of you. Hope you had a great new year.

We have started chalking out the plan for this year. And this year is all about scale for us. More cities, faster scale up, more charging points – we are excited to finally take the 450 to all over India in 2020. And, there’s something special for all of you who have been supporting us over the years.

But before that, a quick wrap up on 2019:

Bigger community + new city

Streets of Bengaluru have been buzzing with Ather 450 for more than a year and now Chennai too. Special thanks to the support of the 50+ Ather owners from BLR, who travelled with us to Chennai making the launch iconic.

The power of data and owners’ feedback

Combining over 5+ million kms of ride data with your feedback, we have released 6 over-the-air updates. It’s been extremely satisfying to see the vehicle upgrade every few months. Also, all the insights gathered will help us bump up the hardware in future releases.

Along with the product, our systems and processes have also started to stabilize. This means we are ready to take the next big leap.

What’s happening next week?

All the owners will be receiving an exclusive invite for something new that’s coming up this month, which will be up for grabs for the whole of India. But, this invite gives priority access to our owners and close followers only.

A few more days to go…

Exciting times ahead!
Tarun

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For @everyone guessing what’s coming next, here is one more thing to keep your Monday interesting.

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Do you work at a corporate?

Your company can now join Ather’s corporate partner program - Together Electric! Get office charging solutions, exclusive privileges, early product access and so much more for your employees. Interested? Connect here: http://bit.ly/450TE

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Hi folks,

We unveiled the Ather 450X yesterday to great reviews. Many of our community members could join the unveil and made it special for us.

I believe strongly in our community and we listen closely to your feedback. Whether it’s the warp mode, or extra range, or faster charging, or dark mode, or Bluetooth or 4G LTE - honestly a ton of it is your input that led to their introduction with the Ather 450X.

But beyond the product, this time we had a big announcement around pricing. It’s a first in the industry and which is why I spent several minutes highlighting why we came up with it. We decided to introduce a whole new way to own an electric scooter starting at 99k, with additional subscription packs. We have seen many prospective EV buyers worry about battery degradation and we want to remove that as a concern for our customers.

The new subscription plans allow us to go beyond a typical battery warranty, with a new concept of lifetime warranty on the battery pack all while keeping higher performance commitments from our side. Subscription pricing includes recurring costs like data charges, public charging and new features through OTAs. That means that if your battery health ever goes BELOW 80%, we will just replace it - the biggest worry with Electric vehicles is just gone. Not only that, we have also kept options open to exit the subscription, buy the vehicle upfront, snooze subscriptions when you are on vacation, lease the vehicle, get an EMI on it etc etc.

Clearly we confused some of you :slight_smile:

I apologize, but in retrospect we should have done a better job explaining the concept of subscriptions and its many benefits. I have personally gone through almost all the posts since launch yesterday and I understand that many of you are unclear about pricing, duration, what’s included and what’s not, benefits etc.

With Ather 450X, our prices did go up and we could have spent more time explaining that to at least our community better. I wasn’t kidding when I said that the community is our best creation till date and one we are the most proud of. And whether you buy the Ather 450X or not, we would want to make sure that you continue believing in Ather and a clearer communication remains step 1 towards it.

Towards that, over the next couple of weeks we are planning a series of meetups, open house events, online AMAs etc with our community members and owners to make sure that we can answer all your questions. We will also be soon uploading a detailed blog post explaining the pricing, the subscription and the Ather 450X in more detail.

Tarun

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