Ola Electric Scooter Archives - Gizmochina

Ola Electric to recall over 1,400 e-scooters over recent fire accidents

Sean — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 05:32:32 +0000

Ola Electric, the electric vehicle division of the popular cab hailing service, has just announced that it will be recalling more than 1,400 units of its electric scooters in India following recent fire accidents.

The scooter was first engulfed in smoke before the fire

According to a Reuters report, the company is issuing the recall following a government probe into the fire accidents of its electric scooters. For those unaware, there have been many cases of electric scooters catching fire in India. These incidents weren’t just limited to Ola Electric scooters, and even included the likes of Okinawa and Pure EV as well. Notably, Okinawa has also issued a recall for its electric scooters in the India following these fire accidents.

As of right now, most of these incidents are believed to be caused due to the battery on the EVs overheating in the Indian summer. A lack of proper safeguards and design flaws are believed to be the primary factors for these accidents. Thus, it had prompted the Indian road transport ministry to urge the Centre for Fire, Explosive, and Environmental Safety (CFEES) to launch an investigation into these incidents to find out the root cause and prevent such accidents in the future.

In a statement, Ola Electric said that “We will be conducting a detailed diagnostics and health check of the scooters in that specific batch and therefore are issuing a voluntary recall of 1,441 vehicles.” Although, the brand also added that one of its vehicles catching fire was an isolated event and these recalls are just a “pre-emptive measure.”

Ola S1 Pro will soon get a price hike in India; MoveOS 2.0 update by April end

Sudhanshu — Sat, 19 Mar 2022 13:27:58 +0000

A few days ago, Ola Electric announced that they will temporarily be opening the booking window for the Ola S1 Pro on March 17th and 18th to celebrate the festival of Holi. The CEO of Ola Bhavish Aggarwal also tweeted out that this will be the last chance to get the Ola S1 Pro for Rs 1,29,999 (ex-showroom).

Thanks to all who’ve purchased S1 Pro already and special thanks to those who've bought their 2nd or 3rd S1 Pro!

Last chance to get it for 129,999. We'll be raising prices in the next window. This window ends 18th midnight!
Buy now, only on the Ola app! pic.twitter.com/I7FF0GlXQD

— Bhavish Aggarwal (@bhash) March 17, 2022

The announcement comes after Ola competitor Ather announced a price hike for its A450X and the 450 Plus electric scooters. The brand has not yet revealed the new pricing of the S1 Pro electric scooter, but experts have speculated a 3-5% price hike.

Other than that, Ola will also be pushing out the MoveOS 2.0 via an OTA update around the end of April. The MoveOS 2.0 is said to enhance the overall ride experience and bring features like turn-by-turn navigation, location sharing with the scooter, and locating a charging station nearby. The update will also bring a companion app, new Bluetooth-based functions, cruise control, and general bug fixes and performance improvements.

Ola S1 Pro features

Ola S1 Pro electric scooter comes with an 8.5kW motor capable of producing 58Nm of torque. The 3.97kWh battery of the Ola S1 Pro promises a 181km range on a single full charge. However, in real-life experience, the actual range comes out around 135km. The scooter takes around 6 hours to charge from 0-100 percent via a home wall socket. Ola claims a top speed of 115km/hr on the S1 Pro and a 3-second time to acceleration speed of 0-40km/hr.

Other features on the EV include a 7-inch touchscreen display and 3GB onboard RAM. The e-scooter has 4G connectivity, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and voice control connectivity options.

Indian e-scooter giant Ola to open an Electric Vehicles facility in the UK

Jed John Ikoba — Sat, 29 Jan 2022 17:37:25 +0000

In a clear expansionist move, Indian ride-hailing startup and fast-rising EV manufacturer Ola plans to build a £100m ($134.06m) electric vehicle research and development (R&D) facility in the United Kingdom. The news comes as a boost to the UK automotive industry which has had a mixed bag of fortunes in recent times.

Ola is a rapidly-expanding tech firm with electric vehicle manufacturing interests. It already has a few e-scooters under its belt and recently unveiled its concept car design in India. Ola’s investment in the new R&D plant is to subsequently yield electric vehicles wholly designed by the firm.

Ola Electric, days back raised $200m in funding at a reported $5b valuation from Japanese tech investor, Softbank. It is also reportedly planning a stock market float to raise as much as $2bn.

Ola is a leading ride-hailing app, with the company saying it is the third-largest in the world. Ola launched its taxi app operations in the United Kingdom in 2018. It is operational in several UK cities including London, Birmingham, and Cardiff. The new facility will be sited in Coventry in the West Midlands, the center of the UK automotive industry. It will create up to 200 jobs in design and engineering, with focus also beamed on research on EV battery technology.

Ola said the new UK facility will collaborate closely with the headquarters, although little detail was provided on the manufacturing capacity of the Coventry facility.

The £100m ($134.06m) investment seems to be a vote of confidence in the UK automotive industry as it continues to rebound after years of underperformance. This has led to a recent surge in investment in the sector. London’s trade issues with the EU also saw some of the big players holding back to get clarity in the market. The UK EV market holds some promise as EVs still only accounted for about 12% of UK car sales in 2021.

According to the company, the new UK plant, Ola Futurefoundry will enable the company to tap into the automotive design and engineering talent in the UK to create the next generation of electric vehicles. The plan remains to continue to produce affordable electric vehicles in the UK. The company hopes to create a world-class design and R&D team with global sensibilities.

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Ola S1 final payment window reopens January 21, deliveries expected till Feb

Sudhanshu — Fri, 14 Jan 2022 15:37:31 +0000

Earlier this week, Ola Electric ramped up the production of the S1 scooters to 1000 units a day. The company’s CEO Bhavesh Aggarwal also announced that Ola Electric will soon be opening the payment window for remaining customers. Now, Aggarwal has announced the date at which the final purchase window of the Ola S1 electric scooter will open.

Earlier today, the Ola Electric CEO took to Twitter to reveal that the final purchase window will open on January 21st at 6 PM for customers who have previously booked an S1 scooter and already paid the initial Rs. 20,000. The eligible customers will need to pay the remaining sum on the Ola app to initiate the delivery process.

Lohri ki lakh lakh vadhaiyan, Sankrati ki shubhkaamnayein, Pongal vazhthukkal!

We’re celebrating with our own harvest

Sea of scooters awaits! Final payment window opens Jan 21, 6pm in Ola App for all customers who've paid 20k. We'll dispatch across Jan & Feb. pic.twitter.com/RZSAeclC0e

— Bhavish Aggarwal (@bhash) January 14, 2022

The delivery process is said to commence from January end and customers will likely receive their S1 scooters by the end of February.

The announcement comes as a sigh of relief for customers who had previously paid the Rs 20,000 deposit but Ola had to close the final payment window due to hindrance in production caused by the ongoing global chip shortage.

The company has also announced that they are working on the missing features in the S1 scooters like cruise control, hill hold, navigation and they will be added to the e-scooters till July 2022 via an OTA software update.

Ola Electric S1 scooter’s missing features to arrive by June 2022

Sudhanshu — Wed, 12 Jan 2022 02:17:38 +0000

Ola Electric S1 and S1 Pro scooters started shipping in December 2021. Since then, the e-scooters have faced numerous performance, quality, and software complaints. The one complaint that stands out is the missing features that the company had promised earlier. Now, OLA Electric‘s Chief Marketing Officer has provided some updates on the situation.

Ola Electric’s S1 Pro scooters are currently shipping without functional key features like cruise control, Hyper mode, hill-hold assist, and the navigation feature which is common in both S1 and S1 Pro models.

Varun Dubey, Chief Marketing Officer at Ola Electric, recently said during an interview that “features like cruise control, hill hold, navigation, etc. are coming up in the next few months by June. That is what we are going to deliver and it is not just about those features. As consumers continue to use the scooter and live with the scooter, we will learn and we will keep adding more and more features which consumers will continue to get.”

He added, “For us, the scooter is as much of a software platform as it is a hardware platform and even in September when we had opened up the windows and done the media test rides, we had explained it clearly that the software is going to come in stages and we are going to release these as important software updates over several months in 2022.”

So it appears that Ola Electric scooter customers might have to potentially wait for months before the software update that makes these key features functional finally arrives.

Additionally, the executive also answered the range discrepancy complaints by the S1 Pro customers stating that the scooter has an ARAI certified range of 181 Kms which is measured for ideal conditions.

Dubey clarified that the real-world range of the S1 Pro electric scooter is 135 km. The Ola Electric rep also claimed that they have shared the true range of the scooters with their customers.

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Ola Electric S1 scooter purchase window to reopen soon as production ramps up

Sudhanshu — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 16:23:47 +0000

In December, Ola Electric started the delivery process of their much-anticipated S1 and S1 Pro electric scooters in India, which was delayed from their initial delivery schedule of November 30th due to chip shortages.

Now, Ola Electric seems to be upscaling production of the S1 scooters as the company’s CEO Bhavesh Aggarwal states that the factory is now churning out 1,000 units per day. The news comes with another announcement by the CEO confirming that Ola Electric will soon be opening the purchase window for remaining customers.

The company has claimed to have delivered nearly 4,000 S1 e-scooters to its customers since the delivery process commenced back on December 15, 2021.

The company claims that the Ola S1 can offer a range of 121 kilometers while the Pro model’s range is rated at 181 kilometers. Ola provides a portable 750W charger and is also setting up its ‘Hypercharger’ network across the country, allowing users to regain about 75 kilometers of range in just 15 minutes.

The Ola S1 has a starting price of ₹99,999 (~$1,348) while the pricing of the upgraded Ola S1 Pro starts at ₹1,29,999 (~$1,753). The bookings started on September 15 2021 and the company announced it had done sales worth ₹600 crores on the first day, reaching ₹1,100 crores on the second day.

However, if you missed the initial purchase window, worry not, as the process is set to start again soon. Stay tuned for more.

Ola offers S1 electric scooter buyers free upgrade to the S1 Pro, but with a catch

Sean — Fri, 31 Dec 2021 07:36:55 +0000

Ola Electric is offering upgrades to the buyers of its standard S1 electric scooter for free. So, if you bought an S1 in India, you are eligible for an upgrade to the top end, S1 Pro model, but with “terms and conditions applied.”

For those unaware, Ola is a ride hailing service based Indian company that is quite popular in its home market. Recently, it had announced that it was entering the electric vehicle market, with its S1 electric scooters. While the company saw great response to its new vehicles and a number of orders, many early buyers began complaining after receiving the first deliveries of the S1 scooters. We had reported on customers complaining about multiple quality related issues and more.

So now, it seems that the brand is offering upgrades to its customers for free. However, it isn’t without a ‘catch’. Those that receive an S1 Pro through the upgrade will not only receive the hardware benefits. In other words, the model’s software features will be locked and standard S1 buyers will have to shell out an additional 30,000 INR (roughly 404 US Dollars) to gain access to them. In a statement, the company stated that “Customers get access to the best in class hardware at the same price as the Ola S1. In the future, if you’d like to unlock the amazing software features, range, and the full potential of the Ola S1 Pro, you can do so by paying 30,000 INR.“

From the outside, both S1 models appear identical, but the Pro variant offers a larger 3.97 kWh battery compared to the base variant’s 2.98 kWh battery. Other features include ‘Hyper mode’ that is skipped on the standard model. The S1 costs 100,000 INR (roughly 1,350 US Dollars) while the S1 Pro costs 130,000 INR (roughly 1,750 US Dollars). Notably, Ola had stated before that its bookings for the Pro model were higher than the base one, thanks to these additional features. So the free upgrade might help turn over the opinion of the early buyers who can choose to opt for the software features later on.

Ola Electric delays deliveries of S1 and S1 Pro scooters due to chip shortage

Jeet — Mon, 22 Nov 2021 05:11:19 +0000

A few months ago, Ola Electric launched its electric two-wheeler scooters on the Indian market — Ola S1 and S1 Pro. At that time, the company had said that the deliveries will begin in October but that wasn’t the case.

The first batch of deliveries were scheduled for November 30 but the company has now decided to delay electric scooters to between December 15 to the end of the month, a two- to four-week delay from its earlier schedule.

The company has said that the delay is happening because of the shortage of chips and electronic parts. It is being reported that the company has stopped taking any new bookings until the chip shortage has eased.

In an email to customers, Ola Electic said: “Due to the ongoing global shortage of chipsets and electronic parts, there are some unavoidable delays to your Ola S1 delivery. We apologize for this delay and assure you that we are ramping up production as fast as we can so you can get your Ola S1 at the earliest.”

The company has claimed that the Ola S1 can offer a range of 121 kilometers while the Pro model’s range is rated at 181 kilometers. This is higher than other electric two-wheelers currently available in India. Ola will provide a portable 750W charger and is also setting up its ‘Hypercharger’ network across the country, allowing users to regain about 75 kilometers of range in just 15 minutes.

The Ola S1 has a starting price of ₹99,999 (~$1,348) while the pricing of the upgraded Ola S1 Pro starts at ₹1,29,999 (~$1,753). The bookings started on September 15 and the company announced it had done sales worth ₹600 crores on the first day, reaching ₹1,100 crores on the second day.

Ola S1 and S1 Pro electric scooters launched in India; pricing starts at ₹99,999 ($1348)

Jeet — Mon, 16 Aug 2021 07:11:01 +0000

Ola Electric has launched its much-awaited electric two-wheeler scooter on the Indian market. The Ola S1 has a starting price of ₹99,999 (~$1,348) while the pricing of the upgraded Ola S1 Pro starts at ₹1,29,999 (~$1,753).

The firm says that the e-scooters are designed and engineered in India for the world and will deliver the best scooter experience to the consumer. The deliveries of the newly launched scooter will begin in October.

As for the features, there’s a 7-inch touchscreen shatter-proof display. It comes powered by an octa-Core processor with 3GB of RAM. Features on the device include geo-fencing, anti-theft alert, Bluetooth connectivity, GPS and Wi-Fi, four ‘moods’ for the sound, a reverse mode, and in-built speakers. The S1 Pro additionally comes with cruise control, hill hold assist, and onboard navigation.

There’s a mono-shock absorber on the front, disk brakes on the front as well as the back, and extra-wide 110/70-R12 MRF tires. The scooter is keyless and uses proximity unlock that senses when you move near it and locks when you move away. It can also be locked or unlocked using the screen on the scooter or through the mobile application.

The Ola Electric app also offers battery and health alerts, and book an appointment from the app for in-home service. The company has also built a new operating system for the vehicle named Ola MoveOS. It is powered by a ‘Hyperdrive motor’, which produces a peak power output of 8.5kW. The S1 is said to have a top speed of 90 Km/hr while the Ola S1 Pro will have a top speed of 115 Km/hr and can go from 0 to 40km/hr speed in 3.6 sec and 3 sec respectively.

The Ola S1 is based on the Etergo Appscooter and thus features the same banana-shaped batteries and the only difference is that the battery on Ola’s vehicles is fixed and is non-removable. The S1 packs a 2.98 kWh battery while the Pro model packs a 3.97 kWh battery – the biggest battery yet on a production electric two-wheeler in India.

The company has claimed that the Ola S1 can offer a range of 121 kilometers while the Pro model’s range is rated at 181 kilometers. This is higher than other electric two-wheelers currently on sale in India. Ola will provide a portable 750W charger and the company is also setting up its ‘Hypercharger’ network across India, allowing users to regain about 75 kilometers of range in just 15 minutes.

Ola electric scooter brings in over 100,000 reservations in just one day

Sean — Mon, 19 Jul 2021 11:42:27 +0000

Ola has just shared figures of the reservation of its new electric scooter. The ride sharing based firm stated that it has brought in over 100,000 reservations within just the first 24 hours.

The company claims that these figures make the electric scooter the most pre booked scooter in the world. Bhavish Aggarwal, Chairman and Group CEO of Ola stated that “I am thrilled by the tremendous response from customers across India for our first electric vehicle. The unprecedented demand is a clear indicator of shifting consumer preferences to EVs. This is a huge step forward in our mission to transition the world to sustainable mobility. I thank all the consumers who have booked the Ola Scooter and have joined the EV revolution. This is only the beginning!”

For those interested, you can also reserve the Ola scooter for 499 INR (roughly 6.7 US Dollars) on the company’s official OlaElectric website. Talking about the vehicle, the Ola electric scooter has been made in India and features a twin pod LED headlamp with an LED strip running around it. The company had also added that this scooter will also offer the largest boot space segment in this segment.

At the moment, the ride hailing platform has yet to reveal any finer details regarding the scooter. In other words, we have no information regarding the battery or its charging system. This also means that we have no idea regarding the scooter’s range but it could reportedly be around 150 kilometers per full charge.