E-Scooter

For the Shanghai Motor Show, folks at Volkswagen brought battery powered vehicle, called the E-Scooter. The scooter is powered with a 350-watt motor and built extremely light weight.(only 44 pounds without the battery) But its performance
25 miles range per charge and a top speed of 30mph is average. Not impressive...I guess they thought so too. The VW director of design for China, Simon Loasby tells us that the scoots range could be extended with a lithium-ion battery pack and its performance could be enhanced by putting a 700-watt electric motor.
Obviously Asia is the market for this scooter for daily utility use...so VW focused on low cost, possibly becoming new electric generation of Honda Cub, thus the 350-watt motor and NiMH pack.

"Our idea was to come up with a solution for affordable mobility in megacities like Shanghai, and to give people who've never owned a car a way into the VW brand. The E-Scooter isn't covered in VW badges, but you know it's a VW from the shape of the frame, the detailing of the head- and taillight, and the premium quality of the product." says Simon Loasby.

China has already many electric scooters available and average price of such scooters is around $500. VW's E-scooter will be less than 1000 bucks, they say...so I am thinking they are gonna have hard time selling them. I would say, make it high-performance and carry the VW badge for status or make it real cheap to be competitive. The E-Scooters are scheduled to be available in China sometime in 2012.

Source: Autocar.co.uk