Honda announced the “GYRO e:” and “GYRO CANOPY e:” as planned commercial models of electric three-wheeled scooters for business use that use replaceable batteries. The new models will be marketed as the Honda e: Business Bike series together with the BENLY e: business electric two-wheeled scooter, which has been sold to corporate customers since April 2020.
The GYRO series will be used in many business applications such as deliveries. The GYRO series is a three-wheeled model with one wheel in the front and two in the rear to increase stability, and there is also a “CANOPY” model with a roof and wipers that can handle a little rain.
Major companies such as Japan Post and McDonald’s Japan have already taken the lead in introducing commercial electric bikes for delivery and sales purposes. If the batteries can be replaced at convenience stores, the only question is the price. If it becomes possible to deal with issues such as running out of battery power, we can expect to see the spread of electric bikes among the general business population as well as in personal use models.
Source: NetRabo (The original article was partially revised by the author.)
PSR Analysis: Honda’s electrification of motorcycles began with the CUV ES in 1994. This model was sold on a limited lease basis, and this CUV ES was succeeded by the EV-neo, which was released in 2011. In the 2000s, many electric two-wheeled scooters were released by Yamaha, Suzuki, Pro Staff, Terra Motors, and other venture-backed manufacturers. However, the image of electric two-wheeled scooters deteriorated due to the appearance of low-quality models from foreign brands around the same time, and the domestic market almost disappeared, with only the E-Vino, introduced by Yamaha in 2015, fighting a lone battle. The question is whether the release of Honda’s business-use EV scooter will be the catalyst to break out of this situation.
Currently, Honda, Yamaha, Suzuki, and Kawasaki have established a consortium for interchangeable batteries for electric motorcycles in April 2019 and are working on specifications and standardization so that interchangeable batteries can be used across manufacturers.
The wave of electrification is coming very fast, and motorcycles are no exception. In Taiwan, KYMCO and GOGORO have already released a number of interchangeable battery models to increase the number of users. In China, the number of EV scooters is exploding as engine models are banned in urban areas. Looking at these trends overseas, it must be said that Japanese motorcycle manufacturers are far behind the curve in electrification at the moment. It is often said that four Japanese companies currently manufacture more than half of the world’s motorcycles, but this situation is likely to change drastically in the next three years or so. PSR
Akihiro Komuro is Research Analyst, Far East and Southeast Asia, for Power Systems Research.
