Battery-powered tricycle receives LTO approval
A STARTUP company building electric tricycles, or e- trikes, announced it had recently managed to register with the Land Transportation Office its product.
Beet Phils., owned by Japanese firm Uzushio Electric Co., said its lithium- ion battery- powered etrike can now be driven anywhere in the country. The company noted its e- trike is produced in commercial quantities.
Beet Phils. is looking to supply its product to the Asian Development Bank-funded E-Trike Project, which will finance the manufacturing of around 100,000 e-trikes. The e-trikes are seen to gradually replace the estimated 3.5 million gasolinefueled public-transport tricycles in the Philippines, a move that Beet Phils. said will help resolve air and noise pollution concerns.
“Beet continues to gather data from tricycle drivers, and these data are used for product development,” said Beet Phils. President Tokushi Nakashima, who added that the company intends to “increase drivers’ income and reduce fuel expenses in order to help improve drivers’ livelihood and the environment.”
The company’s e- trike is composed mainly of an AC motor that derives its power from lithiumion batteries, a computerized vehicle control unit, an inverter and a battery management system. Beet Phils. said these make the vehicle “stable under various road and weather conditions.”
In a related development, the company bared that it had tapped Softbank Mobile Corp. to develop a daily billing system for lease and loan payments for the e- trikes. The billing system will be integrated into the vehicle’s control unit.
BRIAN AFUANG