Kwang Yang Motor Co (光陽工業), which has been selling gasoline-powered scooters for more than half a century under the name KYMCO, is reshaping its brand image by adopting a second brand name, Ionex, for its electric scooter business as it moves to challenge market leader Gogoro Inc (睿能創意).
Kwang Yang sait it wanted to change consumers’ mindset about the company by creating an independent sales team to sell its electric two-wheelers. Ionex Taiwan Co (台灣光捷), a fully owned subsidiary, is tasked with crafting a new marketing strategy and building additional sales channels.
Kwang Yang in December 2019 boosted the paid-in capital of Ionex to NT$300 million (US$10.51 million) from NT$15 million, Ministry of Economic Affairs data showed.
Photo: Yang Ya-min, Taipei Times
Prior to this year, Kwang Yang’s electric scooters were sold at its existing sales outlets, alongside its gasoline-powered scooters, since their debut three years ago.
“We have to compete with a strong rival in the home market. Kwang Yang has long been the nation’s biggest maker of gasoline-powered scooters. That brand image is deeply rooted in local consumers’ mind,” Kwang Yang chairman Allen Ko (柯勝峰) said in an interview with a small group of reporters on Wednesday last week.
Gogoro holds 77 percent of the domestic electric scooter market, while Kwang Yang only has 4 percent, according to the Industrial Development Bureau’s tallies.
As of Thursday, Gogoro had sold 345,190 electric vehicles versus Kwang Yang’s 19,215.
“To catch the consumer’s eye, we have to adopt a new brand and forgo KYMCO,” Ko said. “You will not see KYMCO in our electric scooter commercials anymore.”
The company has replaced the KYMCO label with Ionex for its new electric scooters, he said.
Kwang Yang plans to open 11 dedicated stores for its electric scooters, called Ionex stores, within one month and aims to more than quadruple that to 50 by the end of this year.
However, Kwang Yang is not ready for a spin-off at this time, Ko said.
Electric scooters and gasoline-powered scooters are developed and manufactured in the same factories to maintain cost-efficiency, Ko said.
The Ionex brand will only be adopted for the local brand, as its KYMCO brand is better known in global markets, Ko said.
Kwang Yang offers electric scooters to GrabWheels, an electric scooter sharing service arm of Grab Holdings Inc, in Indonesia, he said.
Battery supply is as important, if Kwang Yang wants to become a key player, Ko said.
This was Kwang Yang’s weakness, as the company had previously rolled out scooters that riders could only charge at home or at charging stations, he said.
Kwang Yang plans to build 1,500 battery swap stations by the end of this year and to increase the number to 4,000 by the end of next year.
It is forming partnerships with Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), President Chain Store Corp (統一超商), Fubon Insurance Co (富邦產險) and Carrefour Taiwan (家樂福) to install battery swap stations, it said.
To speed up deployment, Kwang Yang is considering signing up electric scooter riders who have space that can be turned into a small-scale battery swap station, he said.
He attributed a short supply of fully charged batteries to a slump in domestic electric scooter sales last year, in addition to adjustments in purchase subsidies from the government.
To ensure sufficient battery supply, Kwang Yang said it is taking a different approach from its major rival.
The company will suspend sales of electric scooters if its pace of battery swap deployment cannot keep up with the pace of its sales growth, Ko said.
It also offers riders two types of batteries — for charging or swapping.
Gogoro riders can only swap batteries with fully-charged ones at battery swap stations, which requires an intensive network.
PATENTS: MediaTek Inc said it would not comment on ongoing legal cases, but does not expect the legal action by Huawei to affect its business operations Smartphone integrated chips designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科) on Friday said that a lawsuit filed by Chinese smartphone brand Huawei Technologies Co (華為) over alleged patent infringements would have little impact on its operations. In an announcement posted on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, MediaTek said that it would not comment on an ongoing legal case. However, the company said that Huawei’s legal action would have little impact on its operations. MediaTek’s statement came after China-based PRIP Research said on Thursday that Huawei filed a lawsuit with a Chinese district court claiming that MediaTek infringed on its patents. The infringement mentioned in the lawsuit likely involved
Taipei is today suspending work, classes and its US$2.4 trillion stock market as Typhoon Gaemi approaches Taiwan with strong winds and heavy rain. The nation is not conducting securities, currency or fixed income trading, statements from its stock and currency exchanges said. Authorities had yesterday issued a warning that the storm could affect people on land and canceled some ship crossings and domestic flights. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) expects its local chipmaking fabs to maintain normal production, the company said in an e-mailed statement. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp said it has activated routine typhoon alert
GROWTH: TSMC increased its projected revenue growth for this year to more than 25 percent, citing stronger-than-expected demand for AI devices and smartphones The Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER, 台灣經濟研究院) yesterday raised its forecast for Taiwan’s GDP growth this year from 3.29 percent to 3.85 percent, as exports and private investment recovered faster than it predicted three months ago. The Taipei-based think tank also expects that Taiwan would see a 8.19 percent increase in exports this year, better than the 7.55 percent it projected in April, as US technology giants spent more money on artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure and development. “There will be more AI servers going forward, but it remains to be seen if the momentum would extend to personal computers, smartphones and
Catastrophic computer outages caused by a software update from one company have once again exposed the dangers of global technological dependence on a handful of players, experts said on Friday. A flawed update sent out by the little-known security firm CrowdStrike Holdings Inc brought airlines, TV stations and myriad other aspects of daily life to a standstill. The outages affected companies or individuals that use CrowdStrike on the Microsoft Inc’s Windows platform. When they applied the update, the incompatible software crashed computers into a frozen state known as the “blue screen of death.” “Today CrowdStrike has become a household name, but not in