The US desperately needs some competition in the EV motorcycle space.
There are several players but they still seem boutique and and way over what the price should be.
There are several players but they still seem boutique and and way over what the price should be.
But I sadly know enough to know that doing hardware in the USA is nightmare level expensive and difficult. I could pull every string and empty every account into making an eBike with twice the cost and half the performance of it's Chinese counterpart. I'd much rather just make an app that takes a cut for connecting people with eBikes that fit their needs/desires.
Sure, more competition is good, but given their safety profile (terrible!) I suspect motorcycles are a secondary mode of transportation rather than a primary. Mopeds for intra city usage seems more high demand than highway speed vehicles that have to drive alongside SUVs.
I feel like there's kind of a cycle of unsafety with motorcycles on the social level in the U.S.
There's a societal understanding in the U.S. that motorcycles are unsafe, which results in an increased number of people purchasing motorcycles with the intention of showing off how unsafe (dangerous) they can be. And the cycle perpetuates.
Obviously, motorcycles are inherently less safe in certain ways, like your body is going to fly if you get into a high-speed collision, and that's pretty much unavoidable. But when I visit European countries, it seems motorcycle culture is _so_ much healthier. They are mostly seen as simple transportation tools, a far cry from what I regularly see in the U.S.
https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-ceo-driving-xiaomi-su7-...
It's really stupid because Xiaomi isn't making anything truly revolutionary. It's just a lot of consumer thoughtful ideas, not ones that try to shove ads and subscriptions in your dang car. And this is our "existential threat" to a century of manufacturing. Wonder how Henry would feel.
(and the tarriffs stuff isn't just 2025. That's been there through all of Biden's admin. Good idea... If they used those 5 years to actually ramp up production).
But I was talking about motorcycles. There are some new brands like Zero and some old ones like Harley (the "live wire" disaster). They need a fire lit to make real bikes at real prices.
The revisionist power wants to become status quo. They need to beat the status quo power and they won't do it following the status quo's rulebook. They look for anything that might differentiate them, make them appealing to even narrow groups - they are trying to get a foothold and grow from there. They are cool, innovative, and disruptive, people think.
As soon as the revisionist becomes status quo, they adopt the status quo behaviors. Look at formerly revisionist SV.
The second archetype, electric vehicle-only manufacturers, includes startups as well as more established players like Tesla, which do not operate under organized labor contracts. Their average labor costs range from $1,502 to $13,291, and they face high per vehicle production costs due to low manufacturing volumes. EV-only manufacturers also have been heavily reliant on government subsidies, which are now being cut back by the new administration.
The third archetype, mainstream model manufacturers, has an average labor cost of $880 per vehicle and includes traditional high-volume automakers from various countries. Japanese manufacturers enjoy lower labor costs per vehicle, with an average of $769, compared with manufacturers in the United States, where the average is $1,341 — a labor cost per vehicle that reflects recent historic union gains.
The fourth archetype, Chinese car manufacturers, has an average labor cost of $585 per vehicle, characterized by low wages and high efficiency. The group maintains the lowest overall conversion costs in the industry by leveraging its newer factories, efficient supply chains, and high production volumes” - https://www.oliverwyman.com/our-expertise/insights/2025/apr/...
Motorcycles are also interesting because they're at most 1.5-2x as efficient as cars, especially on the highway (poor aerodynamics). They're small so people assume they're gas-sippers, but at 80mph a sportsbike is not giving you much more than 45mpg. A typical bike carries 3-ish gallons for an effective range of 150 miles. To give an ev motorcycle a comparable range, you're looking at close to 20kwh of battery. In China a kwh of NMC battery is said to be $120-ish, so you're looking at $2k in just battery, excluding drive unit, inverter/charger, thermal management. Conversely a motorcycle engine and transmission is typically a single unit, all bathed in the same oil and amortized over huge production runs, for a simple 80hp drivetrain, I wouldn't be surprised if the marginal cost of production is $2k for the whole thing.
For a pedelec (actual e-bike meant to be pedaled), wall charging with a brick/wall-wart works fine. That's how they all work, at least any that I've seen. Some have removable batteries to make that easier, but the high-end models tend to have the battery wedged into the down tube and not removable (with complete disassembly of the bike).
For an e-scooter or light e-moto, wall charging should work fine, but it won't be fast. YOu're looking at 3+ hours to charge. Fine for most commuters and running errands, but not suitable for a delivery vehicle - they'd have to hot-swap batteries (or complete bikes).
Not sure about large electric motorcycles - there aren't that many out there right now. I'd guess similar to e-scooters, just with an even longer 10-80 or 0-100 charge period.
As for electric, I would guess it's zero? (maybe harley?)
It's interesting that japanese motorcycles have always been on the cutting edge... but not on the cutting edge as far as electric.
Yes, exactly [0].