Opibus has introduced the first all-electric bus in Kenya and the first African designed electric bus.

PHOTO/COURTESY

Opibus is a Swedish-Kenyan technology company that designs, develops and deploys electric vehicles tailored for Africa.

The company was founded in 2017, becoming the first company to deliver locally produces motorcycles and vehicles.

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This is the first major step in the company's vision to provide a locally designed and developed electric bus that can be mass-produced for the pan-African market by the end of 2023.

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The bus is designed and developed in-house with local engineering talent while utilising local manufacturing partners. 

The bus is expected to lower significantly the cost of importing fully built electric buses.

The bus also boasts superior performance compared to a diesel-powered bus.

Opibus says the bus will reduce maintenance costs by about 80 per cent since it has no combustion engine, manual gearboxes, oil filters or gaskets.

PHOTO/COURTESY

The manufacturer capitalised on the significantly lower electricity charges as opposed to the ever-increasing fuel prices and noted this lowers the operating expenses by 50 per cent.

According to Project Coordinator Dennis Wakaba, the bus will be launched commercially in 2022. The bus will be further tested in the second half of 2022 by the commercial deployment of 10 units of the bus to help the manufacturer gather feedback.

“This first electric bus is set to be launched commercially mid this year. Following this, the platform will be tested at scale in commercial deployment of 10 buses during the second half of 2022. In doing so, we ensure that we gather valuable feedback to continue the development of the product for an optimized market fit. It feels great to be the first movers in this very exciting space,” Wakaba said.

The initial deployment of the buses will be in peri-urban areas around Nairobi Metropolitan.

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Opibus will also install several charging points along with the bus deployment. 

The chargers will feature Alternating Current (AC) charger, which is slow and a Direct Current (DC) charger, which is fast.

The bus will be able to take a full charge in an hour using the fast charger, enabling seamless operations.

Opibus says the bus can travel for 120 kilometres on a full charge.


PHOTO/COURTESY