A 2014 Japanese electric superbike that promised literbike thrills for India, then turned out to be a rebodied Zero S, complete with a cease-and-desist. It never reached production. Listed for the historical record, with every claimed figure treated as an unverified concept number.
Not a bike you can buy, and never was. Shown at Auto Expo 2014 by Tokyo's Terra Motors and announced for India at about 1.8 million rupees, the Kiwami was widely reported as a rebodied Zero S from California's Zero Motorcycles, which sent a cease-and-desist. It never reached production. Treat every spec below as a 2014 concept claim, not a verified figure.
A full 5-year cost-to-own breakdown for this model is not possible, and we will not invent one: the Kiwami was never produced or sold, so there is no MSRP that anyone actually paid, no ownership data, no resale market, and no service history. The only verifiable money figure is the 2014 announced price of about 1.8 million rupees (roughly $28,740 at the time) for the planned Indian launch that never happened.
The history behind the headlines: what it was, the Zero S controversy, why it died, and the standard scorecard. All sourced.
The Terra Motors Kiwami was unveiled in early 2014 by Tokyo-based Terra Motors and announced for India at around 1.8 million rupees, pitched as the country's first electric superbike with literbike-rivaling acceleration. Press at the time, including Autoblog and Asphalt and Rubber, identified it as a Zero S from California's Zero Motorcycles wearing new bodywork. Zero confirmed it had no licensing or supply agreement beyond shipping a few drivetrains and a complete Zero S for prototype testing, then sent a cease-and-desist. The Kiwami never reached production. It exists today as a showcase and a cautionary tale, not a bike you can buy.
Short answer: nobody, as a purchase. Here is the longer one.
There is no buyer, because there is no product. We include this page for the historical record, not as a buying guide.
Impossible. The Kiwami was never produced or sold. There are no units, no dealers, no parts, and no support. If you see one offered for sale, treat the listing with extreme caution.
Worth knowing. It is an early, well-documented example of a "new plastics over someone else's drivetrain" launch, and of how quickly the original manufacturer noticed and acted.
A clean lesson: an electric drivetrain plus fresh bodywork does not make an original motorcycle, and other people's intellectual property tends to notice. The cease-and-desist ended any path to market.
The struck-through line is what the 2014 announcement said; the big line is what the press and the manufacturer's own statements established.
The defining fact about this bike is not a feature. It is whose bike it actually was.
The Kiwami's "innovation" was its bodywork. The drivetrain underneath was reported to be someone else's.
Autoblog, Asphalt and Rubber, and others identified the Kiwami as a Zero S from Zero Motorcycles with new fairings. The claimed "original Terra Motors superbike" was, per that reporting, a rebody.
⚠ OversoldZero's global marketing VP said the company was shocked to find a Zero S under the panels, with no licensing or supply agreement beyond a couple of drivetrains and a complete Zero S for prototype testing. Zero then sent a cease-and-desist and signaled it would seek legal remedy.
⚠ The killer blowAt around 1.8 million rupees, the Kiwami was very expensive for the Indian market it was aimed at, especially for a 2014 electric two-wheeler. Price and controversy together left no path to the showroom.
⚠ MispricedThe claimed performance numbers were derived from Zero hardware and were never independently confirmed on a production Kiwami, because there was no production Kiwami. Every figure is a concept claim.
⚠ UnverifiedFor a real bike, this is where we run the physics. Here, the honest move is to refuse to pretend we can.
We normally derive range and power from the battery's voltage and amp-hours. For the Kiwami, those inputs were never disclosed, so we will not fake the arithmetic.
Terra Motors quoted a ~10 kW (about 13 hp) motor, a ~160 km/h (about 99 mph) top speed, a ~200 km (about 124 mile) range, and a ~6 hour charge. The one conversion we can do honestly is watts to horsepower:
But the rest of our standard math needs the battery's voltage and amp-hours, and those were never published. Without them we cannot honestly compute usable energy or a real range:
Two forces, the price and the controversy, and no path between them to a showroom.
The Kiwami had a launch event and a price, and then it had a legal problem and a market problem at the same time.
| Factor | What happened | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| The reveal | Shown at Auto Expo 2014 in India, announced for launch at ~1.8M INR. | announced |
| The origin | Press identified it as a rebodied Zero S; Zero confirmed no licensing agreement. | disputed |
| The legal action | Zero sent a cease-and-desist and signaled it would seek legal remedy. | blocked |
| The price | ~1.8M rupees was steep for the Indian market it targeted. | mispriced |
| The outcome | No production, no sales, no Kiwami you can own. | never built |
Between the steep price for the Indian market and the public controversy over its origins, the Kiwami had no path to the showroom. The claimed performance numbers, derived from Zero hardware, were never independently confirmed on a production Kiwami, because there was no production Kiwami.
Reliability, parts, support: all moot, because there is nothing to live with.
We normally synthesize owner-reported reliability themes here. For the Kiwami there are no owners to report, by definition.
One scorecard, identical axes on every bike, even one that never shipped.
Every e-moto on the site is scored on these same eight axes. For a non-production concept, most axes score low simply because there is nothing real to support them.
Our standing methodology, run identically on every e-moto. For the Kiwami, we show it to explain exactly why we could not run it.
We cannot run this for the Kiwami: its battery voltage and amp-hours were never published.
Needs a nominal Wh we do not have, so it cannot be applied here.
No usable energy figure and no production bike to measure consumption on. Not derivable.
The one formula we could apply: 10,000 W ÷ 746 = ~13.4 hp, from the claimed motor rating.
Maker quoted ~6 hours, but with no battery Wh or charger watts published, we cannot verify it.
We cite everything and date it. All Kiwami performance figures are 2014 concept claims, clearly labeled as unverified, never independent test results. Spot an error? Our corrections policy means we fix it in public.
Sources retrieved May 2026, reporting dated 2014. Every Kiwami spec is a concept-stage claim; the bike never reached production, so none was ever independently tested as a Kiwami. We list the claims only for the historical record.