Kwang Yang Motor Co (光陽工業) has set a target of raising electric scooter sales five-fold to 15,000 units next year, from an estimated 3,000 units this year, thanks to the extension of a government subsidy for electric scooter purchases and a broader distribution network.
Kwang Yang has been selling gasoline-powered scooters for more than 50 years under the KYMCO brand, while the company’s fully-owned Ionex Taiwan Co (台灣光捷) is responsible for building and selling Ionex-brand electric scooters.
“The company was greatly affected by the [COVID-19] pandemic from April, when we started deploying our distribution network. The sales of Ionex scooters started an upswing from the end of August. We believe the growth will carry through December,” Ionex Taiwan chief marketing officer Johnson Lin (林振盛) said on the sidelines of a news conference in New Taipei City’s Sindian District (新店).
Photo: Amy Yang, Taipei Times
Ionex has a 5 percent share of the market and expects sales momentum to further rise next year, as it looks to boost its distribution network to 100 from about 30 this year, Lin said.
The government’s extension of a subsidy for electric scooter purchases to next year is an important incentive for the industry, which faces heavy spending on battery development and battery swapping stations deployment, he said.
The company has installed 709 battery swapping stations so far and is on track to hit 1,000 units by the end of the year, he said.
As of Tuesday, Ionex had sold 1,969 electric scooters this year, compared with market leader Gogoro Inc’s (睿能) 63,383 units, government data showed.
Aeon Motor Co (宏佳騰) was next with 7,228 units, followed by China Motor Corp (中華汽車) with 2,048 units, the data showed.
Gogoro operates more than 2,100 battery swapping stations in the nation, and aims to add 583 battery swapping points at CPC, Corp Taiwan’s (中油) service stations by the end of this year.
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