Zero Motorcycles, the world’s oldest performance electric motorcycling brand, has announced that it is moving its headquarters from California, USA, to the Netherlands. As part of the move, the sales and administrative teams will shift to Europe. Zero has its European headquarters in Noord, in the province of North Holland, which will now become its global headquarters.
Meanwhile, the company said that engineering and innovation would stay in Scotts Valley, California, the company’s long-time home.
This is more important than it appears.
How is Zero doing?
The sales numbers cannot be significant. Zero is a privately held company that doesn’t disclose sales numbers. But past disclosures from a couple of years back indicated sales numbers at about 4,000 units per year. That has likely not improved much since Zero’s range hasn’t gone fresher, and the global motorcycle markets where the company sells haven’t exactly exploded.
However, with the recent addition of the X-line, the XB and XE motocross motorcycles, sales are expected to grow, though the mix is expected to weaken. The XB is the cheapest Zero, and retails at USD 4,395. In comparison, the FX/FXE, the cheapest Zero Motorcycles outside of the X-line, retail at USD 10,995.
Zero’s numbers are still small, even though they have been in the business for more than 18 years now. 4,000 units is no great shakes and makes the company little more than a boutique manufacturer.
Are they in Trouble?
Far from it. They don’t have any financial troubles for now. Zero has the backing of The Invus Group, a PE player with deep pockets and one that believes strongly in the company and its long-term mission. Invus entered the captable in 2008 and has since become the largest shareholder of Zero.
The Scotts Valley, California-based company also has Exor, Polaris Industries, and India-based Hero MotoCorp on its captable. Overall, Zero Motorcycles has raised nearly USD 450 million to date, with the most recent investment rounds led by Invus. Now, Zero has announced that Invus is injecting another USD 50 million into the company. We have no clarity whether this is part of the USD 120 million funding round that Zero had raised in October 2024 or is an additional investment from Invus. The October round was also led by Invus.
The Invus Group has two representatives, Philippe Amouyal and Aflalo Guimaraes, on the board of Zero.
The Whats and Whys of the move
The electric motorcycle market in the US is not growing much, and even newer entrants like Harley-Davidson’s Livewire have been struggling. Even in the pre-Trump era, the US customers did not really take to electric motorcycles, especially the types sold by Zero and Livewire.
InsightEV – Global Electric Mobility
Europe is not a great market either, as it remains very fragmented. However, it is much more significant for sales than North America. Zero’s most important products for the future are the X-line off-roaders and the upcoming Neutrino minibike. The X-line is street-legal only in Europe. In the US, one can use it only on off-road tracks, even though the motorcycles come with headlamps. In the North American markets, these small off-road-oriented electric motorcycles have become increasingly popular with teenagers, with Chinese manufacturers like Sur-Ron leading the market. However, there is now an increasing backlash against these motorcycles as they lead to rash riding behaviour. X-line would likely do better in Europe than in North America.
While Zero keeps talking of its Silicon Valley-driven innovation and engineering, it lags behind its peers in tech and engineering. The speed of product development is slow, with most of its flagship range now appearing dated. The motorcycles operate at 116V pack voltage, while peers like Livewire and Verge (400V systems) have moved to high-voltage systems. As a result, the Zero mainstream range is bloated and heavy.
Then there is the speed of product development with important partners. With Polaris, Zero has an understanding to supply powertrains for the company’s off-road vehicles. This is a ten-year partnership signed in 2020. However, as of today, Polaris has managed to electrify only the Ranger XP and Ranger Pro XD to electric.
India-based Hero MotoCorp invested USD 60 million into Zero in March 2023. Both partners decided to work together on new motorcycles designed for emerging markets. However, the progress has been slow, with not even a concept revealed to date.
It is unlikely that existing employees in administrative, finance, HR, sales & marketing roles would shift to the Netherlands. Zero has several roles open for the Netherlands on its jobs page, and it looks like filling up for positions against people not planning to move to the Netherlands.
Meanwhile, we hope that the now vacant space in Scotts Valley would help Zero ramp up its tech stack.
