Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha are setting up a new company in Japan on 1 April together with the energy company Eneos: Gachaco is to offer a sharing service for standardised exchangeable batteries of electric motorbikes and develop the infrastructure for this service.
The Mobile Power Pack from Honda is to be used for this. Gachaco plans to launch battery exchange stations for electric motorcycles in Tokyo and other major Japanese cities from autumn 2022, located in suitable places such as railway stations and Eneos filling stations. In the future, the batteries will also be collected for secondary and tertiary use as well as recycled.
CEO of the new company will be Kazunari Watanabe. According to a statement, Eneos has a 51 per cent stake in the company, Honda 34 per cent and Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha five per cent each.
Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha had previously agreed on standards for swappable batteries and replacement systems as part of the Swappable Battery Consortium for Electric Motorcycles, which was established in April 2019.
Keyword: Gachaco battery swapping service launched by Japanese bike manufacturers