The start up E-loop’s clean, electric passenger cars are available this month in Vienna. Launching with 25 cars, the company plans to expand to at least 50 vehicles in the first year. More than just cars, extending for space as needed offering vans in the future. Spreading gradually to the outer districts of the city, Eloop plans to have hundreds of e-cars for public use in the coming years and wants to expand to other Austrian cities as well.
Eloop will be using multiple models from a variety of companies, rather than a single manufacturer. Like competitors Car2Go and DriveNow, the cars can be picked up and parked anywhere within the designated operations area, to be picked up by the next driver. Start-up users pay a fee of only 19€ for registration and are charged between €.30 and €.38 per min depending on the model of the car, with hourly and daily packages for the longer term uses.
Asfor electro-tanking up, Eloop will be entering an established charging infrastructure, offered in every district by Wien Energie, a public-private energy company.
With a number of investors behind this new start up – including former national football team ex-pro Andreas Ivanschitz – public enthusiasm may bring people to car-sharing who have avoided it due to the environmental costs of traditional petrol or diesel engines.