Ultraviolette says RAM adds Rs 20,000 a vehicle: what EV builders do

What happened

Niraj Rajmohan, founder and CTO of electric motorcycle maker Ultraviolette, said at TechSparks 2026 that RAM alone adds Rs 20,000 to the cost of a vehicle. He did not name a model. The company says it will not pass the higher memory cost on to buyers. In Rajmohan's words, a threefold jump in memory prices should not mean a threefold jump in a bike's price. Ultraviolette is looking for alternative parts, software and manufacturing partners, and is drawing on its stakeholders TVS, TDK Ventures and Intel.

The comment came days after the company launched the X-47 Venom at Rs 2.65 lakh for the first 5,000 customers, with deliveries from November 2026. It is the first motorcycle on the new 100V VX-100 platform and carries a 7-inch TFT touchscreen and a 77 GHz rear radar, both of which need computing hardware and memory.

The cost pressure is global. DRAM prices rose roughly fivefold over the past year, and smartphone memory prices rose roughly 300% year on year in Q2, per Counterpoint Research. Money to absorb such costs is also tighter: Indian auto tech companies raised $1.3 billion across 97 equity rounds in 2026 to 15 October, against $2.1 billion across 195 rounds in 2025.

Reported by YourStory; carried as story 5 in our 25 October 2026 brief.

The numbers

What it means for builders

1. Re-cost your bill of materials at today's memory prices

If RAM alone can add Rs 20,000 to a vehicle, any cost sheet built a year ago is wrong. DRAM prices rose roughly fivefold over the past year. Hardware teams should re-price every memory and storage part at current quotes, mark which ones changed most, and agree in advance at what cost increase the company absorbs it and at what point the price changes.

2. Price each connected feature in memory before you commit to it

Touchscreens, navigation, radar and over-the-air updates all need memory. A product manager rarely sees that cost when a feature is approved. Ask the firmware team to state the memory each feature needs and what that memory costs today. Then decide feature by feature. Some features earn their cost; others can move to the rider's phone.

3. Qualify a second memory part now, not during a shortage

Ultraviolette is looking for alternative parts and partners and can call on TVS, TDK Ventures and Intel. Smaller makers usually cannot. Design boards so at least one alternative memory part fits, test it now, and keep the firmware independent of a single chip. When prices jump again, you can switch suppliers without a new board.

Who should act

• Founders and product heads at EV and hardware startups — Memory cost now moves the bill of materials enough to change pricing and margin decisions.
• Firmware and electronics engineers — Memory per feature and a second-source part are engineering choices that decide how exposed the company is.
• Procurement and finance leads at device makers — Current memory quotes and an agreed rule for absorbing or passing on costs belong in this quarter's plan.

This week

• Re-quote every memory and storage part on your bill of materials at current prices.
• Ask firmware to list memory use per feature, largest first.
• Pick one memory part and identify a second supplier that fits the same board.
• Write down the cost increase at which you would raise prices instead of absorbing it.

Read next

• BMS telemetry and battery degradation — what a vehicle's software has to log and why it needs memory
• EV telemetry over MQTT or HTTP — keeping vehicle data light on constrained hardware
• How many electric two-wheelers were sold in India in FY26? — the Vahan figure and the brand split
• Sentry — catch firmware and app crashes, including memory errors
• Grafana — dashboards for fleet and device telemetry
• ClickHouse — a database for large volumes of vehicle telemetry
• The story in the 25 October brief — the summary and source

Sources

1. YourStory: Ultraviolette's answer to the global chip squeeze, 25 October 2026
2. YourStory: As chip prices surge, EV maker Ultraviolette is working on ways to absorb costs, 24 October 2026
3. Entrackr: Ultraviolette launches X-47 Venom electric motorcycle, introduces new VX-100 platform, 23 October 2026
4. UPI (Asia Today): AI memory boom pushes up electronics prices worldwide, 7 September 2026
5. Autocar Professional: Indian auto tech funding reaches $1.3 billion in 2026, 19 October 2026 — Tracxn India Auto Tech 2026 YTD report
6. productgrowth.in: How many electric two-wheelers were sold in India in FY26?, checked 23 October 2026 — Vahan retail data

Questions people ask

How much does RAM add to the cost of an Ultraviolette vehicle?

Rs 20,000, according to founder and CTO Niraj Rajmohan. He did not say which model the figure applies to.

Will Ultraviolette raise prices because of chip costs?

The company says it will not pass the higher memory cost on to buyers, and is looking for alternative parts, software and manufacturing partners instead.

Why are memory chips more expensive in 2026?

DRAM prices rose roughly fivefold over the past year as production shifted toward memory for AI infrastructure, per a September 2026 report carried by UPI.