The Exchanges

Q Do you think at some point with scale, it would make sense for you guys, if you own the charging infrastructure, to also generate your own electricity, maybe using solar?

A So actually that's the plan. The energy cycle is basically generation, distribution, storage, and then application. In college, we spent many years trying to work on generation. We tried to build engines, ah, very, very high efficiency engines. Ah, we succeeded technically, not commercially though. So, and later on, the idea that we had was to build battery packs, which is storage. And you wanted to build a swapping network, which is distribution. So we justified to ourselves by saying, yaar, energy is not working on generation, but we are working on distribution and storage. This is Ether Energy, the distribution and storage company. And later we built, we were building a scooter on the side to put that battery pack on and we fell in love with the scooter. So we became a vehicle company, but I kind of still think like we do run a fairly large fast charging network. Actually in two wheelers, it's the largest fast charging network in the country.

AI assessment note: “So actually that's the plan.”

Q But why did you think 90,000? You should have been like, freeze, check their credit score, charge 5000 bucks a month.

A So let me tell you the problems that we ran into, right? Uh, and we said 1500 rupees plan, 1800 rupees plan, lot of complications we came up with. Enormous, massive community pullback, like pushback, like, because the biggest feedback that we got was that vehicle is still such a passionate, emotional purchase for me. I need to own this. So I'm not going to pay you a lifetime fee for this. Okay. You tell me when does this EMI stop? I mean, if you create EMI, then it's EMI. Like I've been trying to make a subscription product and make a lot of money out of this. They're like, you tell us two years, three years, four years, when does the EMI stop? So ultimately I need to own this battery.

AI assessment note: “Enormous, massive community pullback... vehicle is still such a passionate, emotional purchase”

Q Is that the big differentiation that everybody's fighting over?

A So I think all, all famous auto companies that you know of right now, they're all building reasonable, okay packs. But between us also, you will see significant battery life differences that are not going to be understood yet. So for example, our oldest battery packs are now five years in the field. Uh, and we have, they are still at 90% plus health, which means we are now internally starting to project eight to 10 year battery life. We know in the industry that I think most of our competitors will also get to four, five year battery life, but eight to 10 is going to be very difficult for most OEMs. It's a difference that will emerge over a course of a decade. Consumer to understand that Ather battery pack, like how Honda engine became famous over a 10, 20 year period. Perfect rhythm, like no sound, amazing quality, but not visible in the first year or two, right? So, but it's a refined difference that will not be understood today. Most OEMs are building enough sensible battery packs that it won't happen, it should be a lot of difference.

AI assessment note: “between us also, you will see significant battery life differences”

Q Cost of recycling the material to get it back?

A Possibly 1002 thousand rupees. 10, 15 dollars, 20 dollars. Yeah. So, if you, like, one of the places where people should go after in India, guaranteed, is recycling. Granted, you will not get that entire two 40 dollars yourselves, because enough people in the chain who will Take that money away from you. But the delta is so large that even if you were to make like 2000 rupees in a pack, it's huge. And the national policy is very, is almost going in the direction of lithium ones in the country should never exit the country. If you import lithium so much pain and look at forex, please make sure you never have, it never leaves the country accidentally.

AI assessment note: “Possibly 1002 thousand rupees. 10, 15 dollars, 20 dollars.”

Q Why are large scooter companies like Ola getting that PLI benefit in Aether is not?

A Because PLI was just written incorrectly. And after the mistake was made, everybody's still struggling. How do, who will correct it? Because correcting a government written document is just who wants to build that cat, right? Who wants to be the guy who changed the document? So everybody's super scared of touching it, though almost everybody agrees unanimously. That's a mistake. So the definition was either aapke waas dhasa kroh ka revenue hai, which no EV company has ever made, which means only listed large auto players who actually have very little interest in actually doing electric could apply for PLI. Or the only other way you can apply for PLI is if you actually are not manufacturing electric vehicles. But if you are a company manufacturing electric vehicles, making actual investments, committed a hundred percent only to doing, doing electric, you can apply for PLI.

AI assessment note: “Because PLI was just written incorrectly.”

Q Is anybody making sales in India? Are we able to compete with China?

A Making sales is a commodity. It's not a technology business itself. It's setting up any, any commodity manufacturing today. The, the challenge of setting up cell manufacturing in India for a while now has been demanding. And the minimum investment required is pretty high. Like if you're not putting, if you're not bringing four, 5000 crores to the table, practically, it'll be very difficult for your plant to have the size and your purchasing to have the size to really make this make any sense. Forget competing with the LG's and Samsung's of the world. Um, but other problem has been demand. Even if you set up a 5000 crore plant, the production out of it has to be sold to somebody. That's only happened now.

AI assessment note: “Forget competing with the LG's and Samsung's of the world.”