Can this US$7,000 single-seat EV spark a revolution in Japan?
In the rural suburbs of Hiroshima, a Japanese start-up is trying to kick start the nation's electric vehicle (EV) market with the smallest, cheapest car it can possibly make.
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KG Motors has developed a battery-powered one-seater that more resembles a futuristic golf cart than it does a modern EV, much less a traditional car. And yet well over half of the 3,300 units it plans to deliver by March 2027 have already been pre-sold to customers.
Incidentally, that puts it on track to sell more EVs in Japan than the world's biggest carmaker, Toyota Motor, which shifted around such 2,000 vehicles in all of 2024. In a country where EVs are still a rare sight, KG Motors is trying to bust a burgeoning myth: that bigger is better.
'Cars are simply too big,' founder and CEO Kazunari Kusunoki said. 'Seeing so many big cars travelling Japan's narrow streets – that's where this all began for me.'
KG Motors' CEO Kazunari Kusunoki (second left) and his team with the battery-powered minibot. Photo: Handout
At under 1.5 metres in height, KG Motors' mibot has a range of 100km (62 miles), a charging time of five hours and a top speed of 60km/h. It will cost ¥1 million (US$7,000) before tax when production starts in October at KG Motors' new factory east of the city. That's about half the price of Japan's most popular EV, Nissan Motor's Sakura.
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