Yamaha To Launch New Electric Scooter Based On River Indie

Yamaha will soon enter the affordable electric scooter segment with a brand-new model, which will be based on the current River Indie. The upcoming Yamaha EV is code-named RY01 and reports suggest that it will use the same battery management system and powertrain as the River Indie. Now, it should be noted that Yamaha Motor Co, Japan invested around 40 million dollars in River in February 2024. The investment was made for River's Series B round of funding through third-party allotment.

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The new Yamaha RY01 electric scooter is likely to go into production during the festive season and is expected to be launched before the year ends. The new EV is being worked upon by Yamaha's global engineering teams in India, USA and Europe. It will likely carry Yamaha's design and brand ethos but engineering, testing, R&D, all will be carried out by River. It will be manufactured by River in Bengaluru and exported to other global markets, 11 to begin with. This also means that there will be increase in scale of production and the production will be mostly localised, keeping costs in check.

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For a global company like Yamaha to trust an Indian EV startup, with powertrain, engineering, battery integration and testing, is a nod to India's growing R&D and manufacturing capabilities for electric vehicles. The idea was to accelerate Yamaha's EV product strategy, which the company was able to do by collaborating with River.

When launched, the Yamaha EV will go up against the likes of the TVS iQube, Ather Rizta, Bajaj Chetak, Hero Vida V1 and the soon-to-be-launched Suzuki e-Access. At present, about six per cent of the total two-wheeler sales in India consists of electric models and that number is only projected to go upwards thanks to government subsidy schemes, ease of use, reduced operating cost and increasing adoption of EVs across the country.

Source: Autocar India