Ather Energy EV Strategy: Tarun Mehta on Engineering & India's Tech Future

In a recent podcast with NPCI, CEO Tarun Mehta has revealed Ather’s EV strategy on how they have consistently pushed the boundaries of evolution, scale, and seamless software development. 

The Core DNA: Pure Engineering

Ather is a pure engineering powerhouse. The CEO Tarun Mehta also revealed on the podcast that their first 300 employees included HR and Sales and apart from that they only hired people with engineering backgrounds. 

This engineering workforce leads to the approach of vertical integration. Instead of owning the factory paint shop and raw materials, Ather focuses on the design. 

They have also equipped silicon, software, mechanicals, and electricals-in-house, and with that they can build advanced features like Traction Control and advanced HMI (Human-Machine Interface) systems at just a portion of the traditional cost. 

Setting the Global Standard 

The CEO of Ather, Tarun Mehta expressed that “We must stop manufacturing and start standardizing. Taking inspiration from Japan’s exporting standards alongside the bullet trains, he expressed that India must create a “Standard Tsunami” in the global markets in order to achieve long term leverage.

The Future of EVs 

When discussing where the EV industry is going, Tarun made a powerful statement regarding the future of EVs and Energy: 

“It’s inevitable that India will become a largely electric nation. Fossil Fuels are not our future… EVs are like an application layer along with many other things, so it is very important to think about the growth of the energy ecosystem.”

Ather is not just replacing the petrol engines for battery, instead they are completely revolutionizing the two-wheeler architecture. By taking a big step towards cloud connectivity, smart helmets, and heavy compute power, Ather is proving that the next big revolution in the field of mobility will be driven by Silicon, just as cell chemistry.