Royal Enfield has long been known for its old-school, simple, and affordable motorcycles with thumping engines. However, the two-wheeler market is inching ever closer to complete electrification, and it’s high time for RE to join the party. Making a step in this direction, the Indian giant’s parent company - Eicher Motors - has announced plans for collaborations with Spain’s headline-making Stark Future EV startup, maker of the bonkers VARG electric motocross bike.
What This Means For Royal Enfield
According to Cycle World, Eicher has invested 50 million Euros into Stark, which translates to a 10.35 percent equity stake in the EV startup. More importantly, this investment will give Eicher a seat on Stark Future’s board, and open the doors to new opportunities, including a future collaboration in the EV space. This means Stark Future will lend its know-how of the electric world to Royal Enfield which will employ it to perfect its future electric motorcycles, such as the electric counterpart to the Super Meteor 650. Now, RE does claim it has made huge strides in its EV journey lately, but we’re sure Stark can give it a new upwards trajectory.
“We love the vision, passion, and focus of the amazing team at Stark Future," Sid Lal, managing director at Eicher said in a stement. "Leisure motorcycles do not easily lend themselves to EV technology at this stage, due to challenges like the battery range, packaging, weight, and cost…Stark Future has been able to understand and harness the potential of EV technology by dramatically outperforming ICE offerings, without compromising on range, weight, and cost. We believe that Stark Future has the highest potential for real breakout growth…into other contiguous segments and beyond.”
What This Means For Stark Future
As for Stark Future, the EV startup will not only benefit from Eicher’s generous investment, but also from Eicher’s industry know-how. It will ultimately help Stark Future globalize itself and there’s a high chance Eicher will help Stark with manufacturing, especially in Asian markets where Royal Enfield already has mega factories. In addition, this could result in an affordable Stark motorcycle, and also one that’s meant for roads, not just for dirt tracks.
This is backed by Stark Future founder and CEO Anton Wass’ following statement: “We aimed to challenge and inspire the motorcycle industry with the creation of the Stark Varg. To now partner with one of the very first motorcycle brands in history, and be part of their journey towards sustainability is a huge inspiration for us. We have been deeply impressed by what they have created…as well as the mindset and focus to continue to build and develop Royal Enfield into the future of sustainable motorcycling. With the Stark Varg we believe we have a launch model that will reset benchmarks, so to know that the bike’s technical basis will spread much further and filter into more machinery and products is another source of pride for us. It has been a short, intense, and incredible journey for us so far but our link with Royal Enfield and what lies in store in the coming years are brilliant signs for the future.”
So what’s your take on this collaboration? Let us know in the comments.