Scooter rental startup Bounce, has laid out plans for rapid expansion of its Electric Vehicle (EV) fleet, 50% of which is currently electric. The company intends to add 4000 more e-scooters by February and transition to a 100% EV fleet by the third quarter of 2021. More than 10,000 vehicles of its fleet will include the company’s in-house designed bikes.
"The pandemic has had an immense impact on every sector, including mobility. Bounce leveraged this period to accelerate its EV adoption, with focus on streamlining supply chain and operations," the company said in a statement. The company aims to address the ever-growing, highly inadequate commute requirement in a green, sustainable and climate-friendly manner. Bounce aims to make its rides carbon neutral by 2022.
“We always believed that widespread adoption of EVs will happen only by fleet operators as the backend infrastructure can be built before fleet deployment, thus solving the catch-22 situation. When COVID impacted business, we took advantage of the period to accelerate our EV adoption strategy. We have built strategic partnerships with several OEMs in the electric and battery space to achieve this green vision. We will continue to lead the micro-mobility sector by providing clean, affordable and convenient options for daily commute,” said Vivekananda Hallekere, CEO and Co-founder of Bounce.
In the last few months, Bounce says it saw a steady rise in the number of daily rides, which have now reached 35% of its pre-COVID numbers. Bounce resumed operations in many cities and Tier II markets such as Hassan, Mysuru, Vijayawada besides Bengaluru and Hyderabad.
“Bounce vehicles have moved from being a convenient option for office goers and students to an all-purpose vehicle for everyone. Today, Bounce is attracting a much wider cross-section of mobility seekers. Besides being affordable and convenient, these scooters are also safer than other options. The company has been witnessing a steady week-on-week growth in rides since end-October,” the statement added.
Bounce is currently offering its bikes to consumers in three models viz. STR, LTR, Rideshare. Short Term Rentals (STR) allows the bike to be rented for 2, 4, 6, 12 hours a day. This encourages better utilisation of bikes throughout the day and solves the availability problem of bikes for users. Long Term Rentals (LTR) enable customers to rent bikes for a period of 15 days, 30 days and 45 days. All bikes are sanitised, following the necessary safety protocols.