Electric motorcycle start-up Raptee has opened its first manufacturing factory in Chennai, which will also house it's research and development team.
The start-up plans to invest INR 85 crore in this plant which will have an annual capacity of one lakh units and will serve as the primary production plant for it for the next 24 months.
A total of 470 people will be hired for the manufacturing. The R&D centre will house development and testing facilities on-site and will aid in future products while the manufacturing plant will house a dedicated battery pack assembly line.
Dinesh Arjun, Co-founder & CEO, Raptee, said “This is a huge leap forward for us. We are at an inflection point where we move from a small R&D outfit to becoming a full-blown OEM and we’ve identified the perfect property to maintain the balance for the years to come. We’ve been very particular about having the R&D and manufacturing teams in the same campus to improve collaborations in this extremely crucial period for the company and that meant the entire property will need to be inside the city. This facility ticks all those boxes and will help service our customers better.”
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Shaji Koshy, Former Senior VP, Royal Enfield, said, “I am extremely happy that such young minds from Chennai have been able to develop a remarkable product and I really want to support this team who has the potential to create a big impact in the EV landscape in India and Globally. It’s an honour and happy moment for me to be inaugurating the new facility for Raptee, which is now moving from its small R&D centre to a full-fledged OEM facility and I wish they run out of capacity very soon in this facility.”
Jayapradeep Vasudevan, Chief Business Officer, Raptee, added, “This facility is big enough to cater to the growing size of our team for the next two years. From a manufacturing capacity standpoint, it also gives us enough flexibility to meet the customer demand from the time of launch. At this moment, as a team we are really happy and proud that we are progressing towards delivering a world class EV motorcycle and customer experience to become a premium EV brand.”