“Focus is on electric scooters, not motorcycles”: Honda’s Yogesh Mathur

Unlike its traditional competitors, who are working on a portfolio of electric scooters as well as motorcycles, Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India is focusing only on electric scooters for now, with its management citing that electric motorcycles do not make sense at this point.

“Electric motorcycles do not really make any sense,” HMSI’s Director for Sales and Marketing Yogesh Mathur told Autocar Professional. “Because motorcycle users are a completely different set of consumers. The EV market, 99% of it, is scooter-dominated. That makes sense for us to focus only on scooters in the electric space.”

For HMSI, apart from the Activa scooter, ICE motorcycles such as Shine and Unicorn have also been driving volumes in both urban and rural markets traditionally. However, when it comes to electrification, the company believes electric scooters offer the most realistic and impactful pathway for now.

Though electrification in India is being driven by two-wheelers, the electric motorcycle segment is yet to see significant traction with limited offerings from a few startups. The requirement of longer driving ranges and the complexity of having larger battery packs have been among the major challenges facing this form factor.

While electric motorcycles are currently being offered by startups such as Revolt, Matter, Ultraviolette, Ola Electric and Oben Electric, traditional ICE players are also working on it. Royal Enfield, with its Flying Flea brand, and Hero MotorCorp, which has a partnership with US-based electric motorcycle maker Zero, are set to enter the electric motorcycle space in 2026. TVS Motor-owned Norton Motorcycles is also expected to launch new electric motorcycles next year.

The automaker has been a cautious, late entrant into India's electric two-wheeler segment, prioritizing a measured expansion. Meanwhile, other traditional ICE players are now aggressively pushing for volumes and consequently, leading a noticeable shift in market dynamics where traditional players are now at the forefront of the EV space.

HMSI’s management has been saying that they are in no rush to flood the market with electric vehicles. Instead, they are closely monitoring the ownership experiences of early adopters to shape their long-term electric strategy. The cautious strategy was reflected in the first set of electric models which are two distinct electric scooters. 

Activa E, an electric variant of its top-selling scooter, incorporates swappable battery technology, which the company sees as vital for mitigating battery degradation. The QC1 caters to a different set of riders, appealing with its light, compact design to daily users, especially women and urban commuters covering 20-30 kilometers a day.

“The biggest challenge in EVs is the deterioration of the battery after three to five years,” Mathur said. “Activa E addresses this by offering a swappable battery model where the battery is not owned by the consumer. This means the asset value of the vehicle stays intact — even after 10 or 15 years, just like ICE vehicles.”

Since launching its EV business this year, HMSI's footprint is currently limited to 21 cities. The company is planning to expand its EV presence to over 100 cities within the next year and capture at least 50% of the addressable EV market. Management indicated that their slow expansion is a strategic decision aimed at strengthening foundational elements first.

“We already have a dealer network of over 2,500 outlets, but we are intentionally not using all of them yet…The idea is to go slow but go strong — make sure our fundamentals are intact. Our network is being upgraded with trained personnel, tools and infrastructure wherever we start EV sales,” Mathur said.

Honda has committed to producing 2.2 lakh electric two-wheelers annually in the near term and has three more EV models in the pipeline for the Indian market. At a global level, Minoru Kato, executive officer of Honda Motor, confirmed the plan to launch at least one electric two-wheeler model globally every year, although specifics about India launches remain under wraps.

India is central to the Japanese parent company’s EV production vision. A dedicated EV plant in Karnataka, set to be operational by 2028, will anchor future EV production. Autocar Professional has exclusively reported that Honda laid out an ambitious roadmap to scale its annual production in India up to 7.7 million units annually by FY30.

Meanwhile, Honda has committed to making all its products carbon neutral by 2040 and achieving complete carbon neutrality across operations by 2050. As part of this, HMSI is also working on E85 flex-fuel technology, which is already being sold in markets like Brazil.

“In India, E85 makes more sense than E100 due to climatic and operational conditions,” Mathur said. The company has already launched the CB300F as an E85-compatible model, signaling a potential shift towards low-emission alternatives in its ICE portfolio as well,” Mathur added.

With inputs from Ketan