Piaggio opens first Ape Electric Experience Centre in India

Piaggio Vehicles has opened a first-of-its-kind Ape Electric Experience Centre in India at Vijayawada, where the company also launched its new electric three-wheeler, the Ape’ E-City at Rs. 1.96 lakh (ex-showroom).

Ape’, a brand with a trust of more than 2.9 million happy customers, is paving the way for the Indian electric revolution with the Ape’ Electrik range and Ape’ E-City as the first offering. At Piaggio, we believe in providing pathbreaking solutions in the last-mile transportation segment with best-in-class technology offerings to our customers. Piaggio Group has a rich heritage of developing electric technology over the last 15 years which we have leveraged to develop these class-leading products for India. We are developing both swappable and fixed battery technology solutions to serve the varied needs of the customer. For Swappable technology, our partnership with Sun Mobility will enable customers to experience a very innovative, smart and unique swappable smart battery eco-system in India.

Diego Graffi, MD and CEO, Piaggio Vehicles

According to Saju Nair, Head of Commercial Vehicle Business, Piaggio India, Piaggio has already installed two swappable charging stations in Vijayawada and has plans to install three more soon.

Powered by a 4.5 kWh Lithium-Ion battery, Ape E-City develops 5.4 kW of power and 29 Nm of torque. The electric three-seater can reach a top speed 45 km/h and returns a range of 68 km/charge. The Ape E-City is the first electric three-wheeler to have swappable batteries and is also the first in its category to get an instrument cluster that is digital. The display offers information like charge status, drive modes, service alerts and more. Piaggio is offering a standard warranty of 36 months/1 lakh km along with free scheduled maintenance for 3 years for the E-City.

The company has said that it is bringing out a fixed-battery version of the E-City in mid-2020.