Gogoro’s electric “Smartscooters” are coming to Europe in early 2016

After a successful launch in Asia, Gogoro will now try to introduce its electric “Smartscooters” to Europe starting with Amsterdam in early 2016. You can’t buy the Gogoro’s Smartscooter anywhere because they need to be supported by the company’s network of battery swapping stations (picture above).Gogoro customers have to buy the scooter without a battery pack. In Taiwan, the scooter starts at the equivalent of about $3,000 and it can go up to $3,500 depending on options. Customers then pay a monthly subscription fee of about $30 to get access to the stations which they can use to swap a battery pack in 6 seconds instead of having to charge the battery themselves according to the company.

The model can be interesting as long as the battery swap station coverage is adequate, which it seems to be in Taipei where the company claims having 95 stations across the city to cover the more than 2,000 scooters sold to date.

For its introduction in Europe, the company is taking an educational approach by opening “boutiques” to teach the public about its transportation model. In those boutiques, Gogoro will provide “hands-on and highly interactive experiences for consumers” the company says in a press release.

Gogoro’s scooters have a top speed of 59 mph (95 km/h) and can travel about 62 miles (100 km) on a single charge. The company sources the battery cells for its packs from Panasonic, much like Tesla, which prompted some people to call the company “the Tesla of scooters”.