Canada, Karsan enters North American market: six e-Jest on delivery

In Canada Karsan enters the North American market. A e-Jest, the leading model of the electric minibus market in Europe for two consecutive years, has been delivered to the Canadian city of Saint John in cooperation with Karsan’s distributor Damera.

A fleet of six Karsan vehicles will start offering service in Saint John in Canada this September as part of the city’s Public Transport Transformation Program. First announced in 2021, with this program, it is aimed to transform the municipal transportation system using electric buses and an on-demand bus service expected to launch later this year.

The electric minibus model e-Jest has become the first low entrance 20-foot electric minibus to carry passengers in public transportation in Canada.

Karsan electric minibus in Canada

Karsan e-Jest, the model delivered in Canada, can be delivered with a BMW-made electric motor producing 170 HP power and 290 Nm torque and also BMW-made 44 and 88 kWh batteries. e-Jest’s batteries are capable of self-charging at 25 percent with regenerative braking system that provides energy recovery, Karsan states. The minibus is also equipped with a 10.1-inch touchscreen infotainment display, fully digital instrument cluster, keyless start, USB port and optionally providing Wi-Fi compatible infrastructure.

Saint John City of Canada has made a commitment to transformation by taking significant steps in electric vehicles. In this important new green initiative where the first steps of transformation took place with Karsan, the commitment for replacing the carbon releasing vehicles in the fleet of the city with battery-electric or hydrogen fuel cell vehicles by 2040 strengthens further. Joining the fleet of the city, Karsan e-Jest minibuses seem to be perfectly suited for on-demand transportation services in residential areas, both with their size and with their emission-free and noise-free operation.

Still in North America, another member of Karsan electrical product family – the Autonomous e-Atak vehicle was sent to Michigan State University in the USA to work on its campuses. Autonomous e-Atak currently carries students, lecturers and visitors on campus, offering Karsan branded autonomous vehicle experience in real traffic conditions in North America.

Karsan electric minibus for on demand services in Canada

Commenting on the subject, Okan Baş, Karsan CEO, stated that they have identified North America as the target market after Europe and said, “We continue our global collaborations with Canada in North America in accordance with our strategy. In this context, following the distributorship agreement that we signed with Damera last year, we realized our first e-Jest delivery and once again we blazed the trail as Karsan. Starting to carry passengers in Saint John city of Canada in September, Karsan e-Jest has become Canada’s first low entrance, 20-foot electric minibus offering public transportation service. With e-Jest that we have delivered to the Saint John city, as Karsan, we are glad to lead the electric transformation of Canada in public transportation. With Karsan e-Jest, we aim to have our electrical product range in the North American market effectively in the coming period, and we continue our efforts in this direction at full speed.”

Gary Crossman, Canadian Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Donna Reardon, Mayor of Saint John, Deniz Çetin, Karsan Exports Deputy General Manager, Raj Mahadeo, Damera Bus CEO, Saint John parliamentarian, a large number of press members, and senior executives of Karsan and Damera companies, which ensured the realization of the project, attended the delivery ceremony held for small bus e-Jest to be put into service in Saint John city.