Drive this car at 4 paise per km!

Can Reva Electric Car Company leverage its first-mover advantage in the soon-to-be-crowded electric car space?

At 7, Race Course Road, the residence of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, you can find a glittering array of cars. They are all fitted with post-modern gizmos and security gadgets, and their armour is thick as a tank's. There is also a small electric car which is used to carry passengers, one at a time, from the high-security gates to the house. It rubs in a subtle message to visitors from abroad: The Prime Minister's office is environment-friendly, and India can make an electric car on its own. The Reva has a place of pride in the fleet.

Cut to the Australian outback 20 years ago. Chetan Maini, a student at the University of Michigan, races the solar-powered car he has built from scratch, against venerated names like Honda. At the end of the long drive, Maini comes third. More than that, it makes Maini, 19, think seriously about electric vehicles.

He first takes a Master's in mechanical engineering from Stanford University, with a focus on hybrid electric vehicles, and then in 1994 sets up Reva Electric Car Company in Bangalore, India's hi-tech capital, in collaboration with California-based AEV LLC.

He names the company after his mother. Over the next seven years, Maini and his men research electric cars, register five patents and try to develop insights into the consumer's mind. In 2001, Maini launches his first car - a two-seater that can touch speeds of up to 60 km per hour and run 80 km on a single charge - under the brand Reva in India and G-Wiz in London.

Text: Business Standard

Image courtesy: www.revaglobal.com

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