Farasis made new cells to Zero's requested specs. In this way, Zero played a key role in The success of Farasis. Luke Workman was the senior battery design engineer at Zero for over four years, and it was during the time that Zero and Jackson Edwards from Farasis worked together to design the pack that Zero now uses.
Farasis had great engineers and quality products, but they didn't make these particular cells until Zero asked them to, and also partially funded the development, with a commitment to purchase a Minimum Order Quantity (MOQ). It would be a mistake to assume that Farasis was making these battery packs, and nobody was buying them until Zero came along.
Also, having a simple drive system may not seem like an advance, but Brammo had a six speed transmission, Zero has none. I forget which electric motorcycle is working on a 2-speed transmission, but Zero has fantastic performance with none. Less complexity, less weight, lower price.
Zero's motors ran cool enough in 2013, but later they changed to an IPM design in 2017 that ran even cooler. It may not seem like an "advance", but it reinforces their decision to use an air-cooled motor, instead of liquid-cooling. There's no reason that this motor can't last 300,000 miles, and then you'd only need to replace two bearings and a gasket.
Maybe there's nothing about Zero that is truly an "advance", but...it's a great design and I don't see anyone else who is copying their design principles. Alta makes a better-performing off-road electric motorcycles, but they are more complex, and more expensive.
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Topic: Zero technical history article (Read 882 times)