- Olga Kokorina
- Translated by Olga Apetenok
- Ru Fr He Ar
Ahra. Era of a new Italian renaissance
The name ‘Aehra’ appeared in June 2022: a small but promising start-up was founded by two Italians, engineer and entrepreneur Sandro Andreotti and Hazim Nada, an expert in theoretical physics and applied mathematics, who sold ‘commodity products’. Andreotti is the company’s executive director, Nada is the CEO. Aehra is headquartered in Milan, but investors are mostly American. The company employs specialists who have worked for Ferrari and Genesis, and the Chief Designer is Filippo Perini, who previously headed the Design Department of Lamborghini and participated in the creation of supercars such as Aventador, Huracan and Urus. The Italian company is full of ambitions: its fruits will be ultra-premium electric vehicles. It is announced that the assembly of Aehra electric vehicles will be contractual, and the quantity will be quite large for such an expensive segment: up to 25,000 units of each model per year. Well, it seems the era of a new Italian renaissance has begun.
The Italians estimated their first model at 160,000-180,000 dollars (159,000-179,000 euros). It is therefore more expensive than the high-end version of an electric hypercar in coupe-like SUV body, the Lotus Eletre R.
Prospects
Aehra plans to ‘rewrite the rules of automotive design’. This was demonstrated by their first model, the electric Aehra SUV, presented in Milan on November 7, 2022. But the manufacturer is already developing a second model, a sedan, which will be introduced in February 2023. However, the place of production of the cars has not yet been determined, which is why the serial production of Aehra products will begin only in 2025. The manufacturer is already planning the third model, a sports car with a 2+2 seating layout. The main markets for Aehra cars will initially include Europe and North America, after which the company plans to start sales in the Middle East and China.
Model range
Aehra SUV
The first vehicle of the new Aehra brand, presented on November 7, 2022 as a very spectacular concept car, is still simply called an SUV. Its design is the pinnacle of aerodynamics: the drag coefficient (Cd) is 0.21, which is an incredible number for an SUV. The automaker said the electric SUV with lifting doors and an unusual design uses a monocoque design and modern eco-friendly materials.
‘We wanted to prove that it is possible to create aerodynamically shaped, eye-catching and spacious SUVs.’
The vehicle turned out to be large: the total length of the SUV is about 5.1 m, the width is about 2 m, the height is 1.64 m. With a wheelbase of 3 meters, the interior is spacious. Aehra has not announced anything about the platform of its first-born, and not much is known about the engines: the electric vehicle will have ‘two or three electric motors’ with a total capacity of 750 to 815 hp, the driving range will be greater than 800 km. But the exact size of the tires is known: 285/35 R23 at the front and 285/35 R24 at the rear. The maximum speed is limited to 265 km/h.
According to Aehra CEO Hazim Nada, a lot of attention has been paid to aerodynamics and efficiency. ‘We wanted to prove that it is possible to create aerodynamically shaped, eye-catching and spacious SUVs’, explained the CEO, adding that ‘the most important aerodynamic point at the front of a vehicle is an angle between the windshield and hood, which we have almost completely eliminated in developing our monocoque SUV’. Great attention will be paid to the most modern technologies. So, we have to wait a bit to see how everything will look like.
