Charging the Future

Narayanan’s Company Making EVs in India More Accessible, Affordable

STORY BY DALE LONG A nirudh Narayanan came to Rose-Hulman from his native country of India with aspirations to use the computer engineering and engineering management skills he would learn to make a difference in his homeland.

He’s well on the way toward achieving that goal as co-founder and chief executive officer of the innovative Bharat New-Energy Company (BNC), an electric vehicle company that’s striving to improve air quality by helping India transition to electric motorcycles. The firm’s two-wheelers are leveraging cutting-edge technology and engineering to deliver high-quality products that can be used for personal transport, as well as for delivery applications. Since their introduction in January 2022, BNC’s Challenger model vehicles have been in high demand. There are back orders for 150,000 motorcycles. The company has produced a pilot volume of bikes, and once supply-chain issues are resolved and in-house battery

manufacturing is established, vehicles should be readily available across the country by the end of 2023. “From Day 1, our mission has been to move to sustainable mobility across all of India. People have shown immense faith in our product and in the company’s vision and we’re committed to working doubly hard to deliver these vehicles as soon as possible to our customers,” says Narayanan, who was born in Bangalore, India’s tech capital city. And an infusion of equity investments this fall also is enhancing BNC’s plans to meet industry estimates that there could be as many as 130 million electric scooters travelling within India by 2025. “While there are many EV motorcycle companies in India already, a vast majority of them have resorted to whitelabeling products from China, and only a handful have truly developed products in India for the Indian market. These vehicles have tended to be expensive and unaffordable for the mass market. We have a quality-built product, designed with the Indian use-case in mind, and that’s nearly 100% India-made and reasonably affordable. Those factors are resonating with our customers,” remarks Narayanan during an online interview from India. “Without much marketing, we have seen incredible interest from our customers. I didn’t anticipate seeing this level of demand early on. We’re now focused on executing well and delivering the motorcycles to our customers.”

Leading an environment-friendly tech company in India was Narayanan’s dream when he left the country to attend Rose-Hulman in the fall of 2006. He earned a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering (2009) and a master’s degree in engineering management (2010), both with academic honors. “I knew attending Rose-Hulman would provide me the strong engineering background that would open doors in whatever path I wanted for my future,” he says. “I took advantage of every opportunity afforded me there and am still using things from my classes in addressing every-day decisions we’re making for this company.” The Challenger model features a 2.1 kWh swappable battery and an indigenously built hub motor. The vehicle can achieve a top speed of 46-49 mph and with two batteries could have a travel range of 120 miles. There are more than 30 patents covering technology advances in battery, telematics, and mechanical architecture.

Narayanan adds, “I knew we had a good, well-built product that could make a significant impact in improving the quality of life in a place that’s so important to me and my family.” n

“We’re a group of engineers, thinkers and dreamers fully designing, developing and manufacturing electric vehicles in India—a dream come true.”

— Anirudh Narayanan (BSCPE, 2009/MSEMGT, 2010) Co-Founder/CEO, Bharat New-Energy Company Simplicity in design and models (with only four colors) offer a quality-built electric motorcycle that’s affordable for most Indian residents.

Learn more about Anirudh Narayanan’s journey at rose-hulman.edu/Narayanan.