In an exclusive interview with Shreyas Webmedia Solutions (SWS) , Mr. Visakh Sasikumar (VS), CEO & Co-founder, Fyn Mobility discussed various aspects such as the company’s vision, prospects of EV Industry, the company’s USP and revenue model and many more .
SWS: When were you founded & What is the product/service you provide?
VS: We started out in 2017 under the name of Pi Beam Electric as an EV OEM and while building EVs for India we noticed that the EV-as-a-service industry was broken. There was a lack of understanding of EVs that led to multiple EV fires and accidents. The logistics industry was still very traditional in its approach with no processes in place or trackability of the fleets and hence giving clients no clarity on their fleets.
We had the solutions as we came from EV Manufacturing as well as Data background. The year 2021 was a gradual progression for Fyn Mobility to step into the Logistics industry with the growing need for deliveries as most of the world came to a halt. With this move we started working on a platform that would give all stakeholders clarity in the process of EV deployments.
We have now successfully stepped into India’s Last-mile logistics & provide EV fleets to businesses that need last-mile connectivity for logistics & commute. We are working towards rede-fyn-ing the logistics industry with the help of our EV know-how, IoT & Technology.
SWS: What is the company’s long and short-term vision?
VS: Fyn mobility aims to be India’s largest EV ecosystem platform for last-mile logistics and commute. This means, seamless operations and real time trackability of our EV fleets that help keep up with deployments and new demands through our internal tech dashboard.
We are expanding our fleet 10X to 2,000 by FY 23 and 10,000 vehicles by 2023-24. Currently, we are present in Bangalore & Chennai and we will be starting operations in Gurgaon & Hyderabad soon.
SWS: Where do you see the EV industry in the next five years?
VS: In the next 5 years we hope to see 100% adoption of EV 2 & 3 wheelers by businesses dealing with deliveries on the Indian roads. Most e-commerce, quick commerce as well as grocery businesses have plans of having 100% electric fleets by 2030. This will not only help in bringing more EVs to the Indian roads but will also give the B2C clientele confidence in the EV ecosystem and help them realise the benefits of electric vehicles in the long run.
As the businesses progress towards a green future, we can see EVs dominating the Indian roads in the next 5 years. A push from the government is also helping this EV ecosystem accelerate. With the government’s support and the businesses promising green fleets, we are spearheading toward our goals much faster than we had anticipated and see a future where there will soon be more EVs on the roads than their ICE counterparts.
SWS: Where did you get inspiration for the Company? How did you go about researching and validating the idea?
VS: Rather than getting inspiration for the company, the company came to us.
With the lock down bringing the world to a pause & everyone becoming immobile for over 4 months, the delivery industry boomed and we were approached by businesses looking for sustainable delivery solutions to help them cater for this need-of-the-hour. We saw a great opportunity here that would help us make a bigger impact towards our long term goal and hence we decided to move from manufacturers to EV-as-a-Service for the last-mile logistics. This helped us understand the last-mile logistics industry closely and identify the loose ends.
SWS: Is the company funded? If yes, how many rounds & how much funding.
VS: Fyn mobility has raised around $3M till date from leading investors such as IPV and participation from prominent family offices such as Sattva Group & Nanavati family, syndicates including Sincere Syndication and Conscience Multi-family Office. Industry stalwarts Arshad Sayyad, Vijay Ratnaparke, Shaji Koshy and professor Ashok Jhunjhunwala have also invested in these rounds.
Our funds have been utilised to develop the deployment platform, expand the team, scale operations to multiple cities and develop new products.
SWS: How does Fyn’s product work & what problems does it solve?
VS: The current logistics industry is very traditional and also has a lot of interdependencies among vendors leading to no transparency in the overall process. We have understood this, and are bringing in a vertically integrated approach through EV fleets that are supported by our tech dashboard, providing us with the visibility to track each step of the deployment process.
Fyn is also addressing the problem of last-mile emissions using IoT, data tracking, and optimal cross-utilisation of its EV fleet to reduce idle time. We are able to give clarity to our clients, similar to what courier tracking services do but for the delivery of EV fleets. With such clarity in place, our clients are able to maximise the utility of these EV fleets leading to higher revenues.
SWS: What is your USP and innovation? How are you different from your competitors?
VS: When we gradually moved our business to the logistics industry, we realised that even the businesses who were adopting EV fleets were facing problems with the EV-as-a-Service ecosystem as this was very new to India.
Safety & trust was a big concern with the recent EV fires. The EV fleets and their deployments were also not timely and scalable as there was a lack of funds and supply issues. Another factor that contributed to this list was the driver churn along with a lot of interdependencies within the system before the fleets were deployed to the clients. Above all, there seemed to be no clarity in these deployments due to lack of data and no clear timelines.
We built our company not only to solve for these issues at hand, but also to create a sustainable EV-ecosystem with the help of our EV know-how, Data and Technology:
We are building a vertically integrated EV Platform connecting stakeholders to make EV deployments frictionless.
We are able to bring quality EV Fleets to the roads with our EV know-how & an internal R&D team that helps in intensive testing of these vehicles before they hit the roads. We are a data driven team and hence bring out smart fleets that are trackable and have automated cross-utilization to maximise the use of each vehicle. With these fleets Fyn Mobility is able to empower their clients with a dashboard that helps them manage, track and plan the deployments of new fleets into their businesses.
SWS: Briefly explain your revenue model?
VS: With EV fleets in the last-mile sector our major revenue comes from last-mile logistics and commute. We are able to provide not only our in-house vehicles but also high speed 2 wheelers and 3 wheelers through our partnerships with some leading names in the Electric industry to our end clients. With our ever expanding fleets and tech enabled operations, we give our customers clarity, timely EV & Driver fleet deliveries and a great deal.
SWS: What difficulties did you encounter when you started the company & how were you impacted by the Covid outbreak?
VS: When we started out with manufacturing of EVs, very few people in India knew and understood the long term benefits of such vehicles. We wanted to bring our Made in India vehicles on the roads to make our country green. While we were working towards introducing EVs as a solution to India’s growing pollution, Covid-19 set in.
With the onset of Covid, the world came to a halt and everyone was subjected to stay at home, there were many problems that arose due to the lockdown. We realised we could solve last-mile connectivity and immediately started working towards the same. We started out with grocery deliveries in gated communities and soon started gaining traction from other businesses that dealt with last-mile deliveries. This led us to the last-mile logistics sector and we soon recognised the opportunity at hand that would allow us to deploy a higher number of EVs faster while helping us realise our goals sooner than we ever anticipated.
SWS: Future product launches?
VS: We are always building or innovating at Fyn Mobility.
Currently our team is working towards building India’s first Fuel Cell 3 wheeler. We are also under the prototyping stages of our in-house EV, PiMO-Premium which is set to redefine the B2B 2-wheeler category in the logistics sector.
While EVs are the future of Indian logistics, charging stations are its backbone. With the growing fleets we need more charging stations and hence are working towards our first vehicle agnostic charging station which should be ready in the coming months.
