Amber One — European EV Concept — To Be Offered For €33/Week Subscription

September 27th, 2016 by James Ayre

Update: This article initially indicated the Amber One comes from Spiri. That is not the case and we have updated the article accordingly.

With all of the boring legacy auto-manufacturer electric vehicle concepts as of late, I had forgotten what a real concept car was supposed to do — something that gives you a sense of the possibilities and future of the industry/technology.

A recent electric concept car dubbed the “Amber One” has reminded me, though. The new electric vehicle (EV) concept is interesting because the idea is for the model to be available for a simple €33 a week subscription fee, while offering solid performance and range.

While the exact subscription figures may be perhaps unrealistically low (at least for now), the general idea could well represent where things are headed in the industry.

The concept EV is itself quite solid performance wise — a 250 mile single-charge range, a top speed of more than 93 mph, and a 0–60 mph time of around 7 seconds, reportedly.

Tech Crunch provides more: “But you can’t buy one — to gain access, you subscribe to a service at a cost of €33 (around $37 US) per week, which will let you use any available Amber One nearby… Amber Mobility says the Amber One is also designed to be modular, so that it can be upgraded throughout its life, which should be prolonged because it doesn’t need to be scrapped entirely when new tech or improvements come along. It’s also designed as a connected car from the ground up, with tight integration across software and hardware, according to the company, which will help reduce overall operating costs. Plus, eventually, the plan is to build in semi- and full autonomous driving capabilities, which Amber says will reduce costs associated with accidents and damage.”

Continuing: “Car ownership basically sucks for all involved, and as Lyft co-founder John Zimmer recently pointed out, individually owned cars sit idle up to 96% of the time, which is massively wasteful in terms of allocated space, infrastructure, expense and eventual waste generated. Amber Mobility’s model hopes to address that, while retaining the convenience factor with a ‘guarantee’ that an Amber One will be available ‘within walking distance at any time’ to users of its service.”

The Amber One will reportedly enter production sometime in 2018, and that limited service will begin later this year for some corporate partners. Initial rollout will be in Eindhoven, Netherlands — something to keep an eye on.











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About the Author James Ayre James Ayre's background is predominantly in geopolitics and history, but he has an obsessive interest in pretty much everything. After an early life spent in the Imperial Free City of Dortmund, James followed the river Ruhr to Cofbuokheim, where he attended the University of Astnide. And where he also briefly considered entering the coal mining business. He currently writes for a living, on a broad variety of subjects, ranging from science, to politics, to military history, to renewable energy.