Inside almost every electric vehicle on the road today sits a motor built around powerful permanent magnets — magnets made from rare-earth metals that India largely imports, and whose supply has become one of the most closely watched chokepoints in the global EV industry. In Bengaluru, a team of engineers looked at that dependence and asked a different question: what if the magnet simply was not there at all? Chara Technologies’ answer is a motor whose rotor is nothing but carefully shaped layers of steel — and it is already powering scooters, three-wheelers, tractors and factory machines across India.
Chara was founded in 2019 by Bhaktha Keshavachar, Mahalingam Koushik and Ravi Prasad. Keshavachar had earlier co-founded Ezetap, the payments company, and the team began work during the COVID years, winning an early Rs 25 lakh grant from IISc Bengaluru to build its first prototypes. By the end of 2021 they had settled on the architecture that defines the company today: the synchronous reluctance motor, or SynRM. The name Chara itself comes from the Sanskrit word for motion.
In a conventional permanent-magnet motor, the rotor carries powerful magnets that the stator’s magnetic field pulls around. Chara’s rotor carries no magnets at all. Instead, its steel laminations are cut into precise flux-barrier shapes, and the company’s in-house Drive Control Firmware steers the magnetic field around them in real time — estimating flux, optimising efficiency on the fly, and delivering smooth, ripple-free torque. The company says its motors match permanent-magnet motors on performance while costing 15–20% less, with peak motor efficiency of up to 94% and controller efficiency up to 98%. And because there is nothing inside the rotor to demagnetise, the motors are built to hold their performance for the long haul.
The range today spans motor systems from around 6 kW to 30 kW, sold as matched motor-and-controller pairs — the SYRGG, SYRAH, SYRTT and SYRTW families — with peak torque from 25 to 125 Nm. They are built for electric two-wheelers and three-wheelers, four-wheelers, and off-highway machines from tractors and golf carts to forklifts and factory equipment. The systems are IP67-rated, run quieter than 65 dB, and talk to the vehicle over a CAN bus, with ABS-enabled regenerative braking built in.
The motors are already at work. The company says it serves close to 100 customers, including Greaves Cotton, BullWork Mobility, Sonalika and VST Tillers, alongside European manufacturers. With Greaves Cotton, Chara has a manufacturing partnership to jointly build its motors and controllers at Greaves’ facility in Shendra, Aurangabad. The company says it is the first rare-earth-free motor company to receive certification from both ARAI and ICAT, India’s automotive testing agencies.
Everything is designed and built in India — research and development in HSR Layout, manufacturing in Peenya, Bengaluru. Full-scale manufacturing began in late 2024, commercial shipments started in early 2026, and the company is now building a new factory and testing facility to lift capacity fivefold, from around 20,000 motors a year to 100,000. The company says it is targeting around 40,000 motors sold by FY27.
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The scale-up is backed by a Rs 52 crore Series A raised in October 2025, led by Arkam Ventures with Exfinity Venture Partners, Kalaari Capital and IIMA Ventures, taking total funding past $11 million. Chara was named a Marico Innovation Foundation Indian Innovation Icon in 2025, and in September 2026 its motors were showcased at the BRICS deep-tech showcase in New Delhi. The company has filed nine patents, with one granted, and is building a presence in Europe, with Belgium and Italy already on its map.
Watch Chara’s SYRTW 14 kW motor system, the company’s rare-earth-free powertrain for electric motorbikes, three-wheelers and farm equipment:
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