Nigeria produces its first electric vehicles after N3.4bn funding from Canada
Jennifer Ugwueke
Nigeria seems to have finally caught up with the latest automobile trend as an indigenous company called JET Motor Company has manufactured the nation’s first electric vehicle called JET EV. According to reports Wednesday, July 22, the prototype of the machine was taken on a 300km test drive from Lagos to Benin. The manufacturer had earlier got a fund backing of $9 million (N3,487,500,000) backing from Canadian-based Africa Development Capital, Techpoint reports. It should be noted that the company was founded in 2017 and two years after started an automobile series called the JET Mover which consists of fine customizable mini-buses
. The company’s director of sales and marketing, Rupani Sanjay, said that the buses can be customized into whatever purpose like a tour bus, cargo, medical, school bus, etc.
“We wanted to create a global product that is built to last. We were obsessed with getting it right because, if our vehicles can work well on Nigerian and African roads, they can succeed anywhere in the world,” he spoke about the manufacturing process. The sales director went further to say that the plan of the company is to build the Tesla of Africa, adding that they plan to introduce other types of vehicles like SUVs and sedans by 2022. Sanjay added that the vehicle can cover a distance of 300km on a single charge.