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[lolachampcar]

Zero having competition would explain why they felt the need to hose their existing customers on residual value.  As much sense as that makes for the short term, it kills residual value and drives the cost of ownership way up.  I believe that is the true opening for Bramo (or any other competition).

My question is, how does the Empulse compare to the Zero (big battery S)?  Price?  Performance?  Weight? Complexity?

[lolachampcar]

OK, I just looked at the Empulse R web site.  You've got to be kidding me.  56 mile highway range at 90 Km/Hr?  You are a target at that speed.  470 lbs???  Six speed custom gearbox from a company building a couple thousand bikes??  I can trust one of these small companies to buy a controller from one guy, cells to build a pack from another and a motor from a third then put it together into something that will work.  Would I trust them to design a wet clutch six speed "electric" gearbox?  I do not think so.......  But then, I've been wrong more than once before.

[ColoPaul]

56 mile highway range at 90 Km/Hr? 

Get your glasses checked.  56 mile highway range = 90 km highway range, not 90 km/hr.   The 56 mile highway range is at 70 mph.

[protomech]

The IET gearbox is designed and (iirc) manufactured by SMRE, though Brammo designed the housing.

I don't think Zero "feels the need" to hose their customers on residual value. That's just the name of the game electric motorcycle land right now, with so many rapid advancements. It's possible that the Empulse may do better on resale if Brammo makes no major improvements for a couple of years, though I think Zero will quickly leave them behind if they stand still. Enertia Plus was competitive with 2012 XU IMO, but 2013 XU 5.7 seems like a better bike. Empulse and the 2013 S are pretty competitive, but I imagine in 2014 Zero will introduce a $14k model that is a substantial improvement over the existing bikes.

[lolachampcar]

Right you are.  I'll look into those glasses
[/quote]
Get your glasses checked.  56 mile highway range = 90 km highway range, not 90 km/hr.   The 56 mile highway range is at 70 mph.
[/quote]

[ZeroSinMA]

Hard to compare the two .. early last year there was no definite ship date, pricing, specs for the Empulse. Many doubted it would ship at all, not without some justification given the numerous delays. They were wrong, but you know

The Empulse is trickling out now (3 posters on brammoforum already paid money for and own one), but Brammo's dealer network is pretty immature and is in the process of growing. By the time most people will see an Empulse at a dealer near them - especially if they were not already on the preorder list - the 2013 Zeros will be available as well. One month is not so long to wait, if someone has already made the Empulse vs Zero S decision.

Brammo may pinch off an Empulse here and there against a rapidly shrinking back order list but they'll never catch up to the thousands of bikes Zero has shipped while Brammo was messing around on the race track and foolishly adding a gearbox to an electric motor that has an inherently smooth torque curve. In the time it took Brammo to get one bike to market two years plus after announcement Zero has lapped them with not once but twice with two major upgrades and multiple models until, as I predicted, 2013 when the Zero S came out, a bike with an equally powerful motor but lighter and thus with greater range, and decent styling to boot, oh, and cheaper, too. And a mature technology vs version 1.0. And available via 50 dealers.

The reason Brammo has 2 vs 50 dealers is Brammo aliented dealers with repeated failures to deliver, such as the Empulse until now and the Inertia+ ever.

I still say Brammo eventually goes out of business.

[Richard230]

I think Brammo will eventually be bought out by Polaris and the range added to the Victory line, or remain a separate model range, like Polaris has done with Indian.  But then Zero might also be bought out too some day by a major motorcycle company who wants to enter the field without having to go through all of the grief of designing an electric motorcycle from scratch.  (Suzuki and Triumph come to mind as companies who don't have the resources, engineers, or funds needed to tackle developing an electric motorcycle lineup.)

[ZeroSinMA]

I think Brammo will eventually be bought out by Polaris and the range added to the Victory line, or remain a separate model range, like Polaris has done with Indian.  But then Zero might also be bought out too some day by a major motorcycle company who wants to enter the field without having to go through all of the grief of designing an electric motorcycle from scratch.  (Suzuki and Triumph come to mind as companies who don't have the resources, engineers, or funds needed to tackle developing an electric motorcycle lineup.)

Maybe but only BMW has the market cap to pay a price to generate a decent return for Zero's investors. I bet Zero goes public and raises $200M. 

[Richard230]

I think Brammo will eventually be bought out by Polaris and the range added to the Victory line, or remain a separate model range, like Polaris has done with Indian.  But then Zero might also be bought out too some day by a major motorcycle company who wants to enter the field without having to go through all of the grief of designing an electric motorcycle from scratch.  (Suzuki and Triumph come to mind as companies who don't have the resources, engineers, or funds needed to tackle developing an electric motorcycle lineup.)

Maybe but only BMW has the market cap to pay a price to generate a decent return for Zero's investors. I bet Zero goes public and raises $200M. 

BMW never buys anyone else's technology, unless they can get it for free.  They will always try to develop their own nutty ideas, even if they don't work and then keep hammering that nail into the concrete until it goes in or breaks.  Or until they finally give up - like they did with their goofy turn signal switches.

I don't see Zero going public until the EV market matures, which could take a very long time.  Today is not like the "Dot Com boom" days and start-ups going public is not the sure thing that it used to be.  I am not putting any money on Zero going public in the foreseeable future.

[NoiseBoy]

Im only a noob in such matters but im waiting for the right time to buy Tesla stock, you only have to look at how volatile their share price is to see that going public is a risky business.

[cirrus pete]

I think Brammo will eventually be bought out by Polaris and the range added to the Victory line, or remain a separate model range, like Polaris has done with Indian.  But then Zero might also be bought out too some day by a major motorcycle company who wants to enter the field without having to go through all of the grief of designing an electric motorcycle from scratch.  (Suzuki and Triumph come to mind as companies who don't have the resources, engineers, or funds needed to tackle developing an electric motorcycle lineup.)

Maybe but only BMW has the market cap to pay a price to generate a decent return for Zero's investors. I bet Zero goes public and raises $200M. 

Oy Vey, there is nothing worse than being a small cap public company in a business with manufacturing margins! It is one thing to go public with an a super high margin tech business where growth or strategic takeouts can turn your stock into a high flier. But, take a look at some other small cap consumer product companies to see how they are treated by the public markets if there is any question of their long term viability.  Check out Skullcandy. $280mm in revenue with huge growth, real profitablity and their stock has been destroyed by traders playing the small cap volitality as fundimental investors stand and watch. I would think Zero would be similar in that the "street" would have a hard time with the long term prospects of the company (not the product) in that any day one of the majors manufacturers could step into the e-bike market and crush them.  Maybe Zero would get bought, but as someone else pointed out in a different post (with a positive spin), they are using other people's motors, batteries and controllers. That might make it easy for the competition to replicate Zero's sucess more easily once Zero and Brammo go through the effort to prove the market. If I were Zero's investors, I would certainly be looking for a strategic exit and not a public market based one.

[lolachampcar]

I've manufactured a product whose competition included Panasonic and Fujitsu.  We did well because we were faster to respond to customer's needs and had greater flexibility to insure our customer's projects stayed on track and on budget.  Had the market been any bigger it would have made it onto their, and other major manufacturer's, radar screen.  We would have been crushed.

The only reason Zero has an opening is the size of the market.  Once it reaches critical mass, Zero will be a memory.  A day does not go buy that I am not thankful we were not trying to sell our tablet when Apple rolled out the IPad!

Obviously this is just my opinion.

[trikester]

I agree. Our switchmode DC power supply company (HC Power Inc., I was the "C") did well because we stayed in the high power end of the business so the market wasn't big enough to attract the big Asian companies. We also got in on the "ground floor" of the expansion of cell sites and large internet servers in the late 90's. We built huge hotswap (never shut down) power systems (like 10,000 amps @ 48V).

BTW- Zero is now using their own motor. That's one part a competitor can't now pick up "off the shelf".

Trikester

[protomech]

10 kiloamps (what an awesome word) @ 48V is a lot of servers.

[cirrus pete]

BTW- Zero is now using their own motor. That's one part a competitor can't now pick up "off the shelf".

Trikester

Thanks for the correction. The more they own, the more IP they can offer to a strategic buyer eventually...