The case study behind the new website
A global-standard
website for an
African original.
We studied how the best mobility brands on earth sell, story-tell and
explain themselves online — then built for a category none of them
actually serve: commercial battery-swap mobility, made in Africa.
01
The ambition
Spiro is already the category leader
on the continent. The website had to
read that way too — global-standard,
not "good for Africa."
Africa's EV transition isn't happening in passenger cars — it's happening under boda and okada riders, on two wheels, as a livelihood. That makes the stakes commercial, not aspirational: the site has to convert riders, fleets and franchise partners, while making an invisible energy network feel real.
Benchmarking wasn't about copying beautiful sites. It was about isolating what world-class actually does — and deciding, honestly, what a focused team should build now versus later.
02
Who we studied
19 brands benchmarked across cars, scooters and e-bikes — filtered to the 4 that actually change how we build, plus the 2 African players who prove the local playbook.
Tesla
Rivian
Gogoro
Cowboy
Roam · Africa
Ampersand · Africa
Ather
Ola Electric
NIU
Ultraviolette
Hero Vida
Zeeho
Yadea
VMoto
Maeving
VMoto
Stromer
Segway
Lotus
Ducati
Harley-Davidson
03
What each does best
Tesla
The website is the dealership.
You configure, order and pay online — the way you'd buy from Nike, except it's a $45,000 car. What began as survival (no dealer wanted an unproven EV from a startup) became the moat: total control of price, story and data, reinforced by over-the-air updates and owned service.
The site isn't a brochure — it's the top of the funnel. Ours splits three ways: rider, fleet, franchise.
Rivian
Lead with the story, not the spec sheet.
Rivian positions as a lifestyle brand, not a car manufacturer — running a "show, don't tell" strategy of high-production films and long-form storytelling. It works: the R2 took 68,000+ reservations in its first 24 hours, all through a fully digital order flow.
Our human story writes itself — a rider earning more per day because the fuel bill just disappeared.
Gogoro
Make invisible infrastructure obvious.
Gogoro sells a swap network with two devastatingly simple ideas: density and speed — ~95% of residents within a three-minute ride, swaps in under six seconds. Underneath sits our exact model: battery-as-a-service, plus an energy play where stations feed the grid.
A live network map — swaps/day, seconds/swap, stations near you — is our single most important widget.
Cowboy
Use 3D to make features explain themselves.
A Brussels e-bike startup punched far above its weight by using detailed 3D product renders to walk you through what the bike does — integrated cockpit, hidden tech, connected features — showing each one in context instead of dumping a spec table. The render is the explanation.
Spiro bikes carry a lot of utilitarian features that matter to a boda rider — payload, real-world range, ruggedness, swap-ease, theft protection. 3D-led visuals let us explain each one clearly, instead of burying riders in numbers.
The local playbook
On this continent, the winning message isn't horsepower. It's earnings and reliability.
The two strongest African players prove a lane Spiro can own outright — one that none of the global brands compete in. Lead with livelihood, trust and uptime, and the rest follows.
Roam
"The Standard of Electric Mobility
in Africa."
Category leadership claimed outright — Africa-first positioning, test-ride-led conversion.
Ampersand
"Energizing the future,
today."
Driver economics front-and-centre — "life-changing savings," powered by predictive-AI operations.
04
Objectives & needs
01
Make the swap network impossible to miss.
A live, mapped network with density and speed up front — our single biggest differentiator, made tangible.
02
Open with the rider's livelihood.
Earnings, savings and reliability lead — not torque. The reason a rider switches comes first.
03
Explain every utilitarian feature in 3D.
Payload, range, ruggedness, swap-ease and theft protection — shown in context, not buried in a spec table.
04
Give riders and fleets one clear next step.
Unmistakable, low-friction paths for each audience — the buying clarity that converts intent into action.
05
Look world-class — and unmistakably African.
Match the global bar set by Tesla, Rivian, Gogoro and Cowboy, while reading as a brand that could only come from this continent. That balance is the whole brief.
05
What we did differently
We took the global bar — and cleared it as
something unmistakably Spiro.
01
An African visual language
A look rooted in the continent we serve — warmth, bold geometric pattern and real local context — so the brand reads as credible on the ground, not imported.
02
AI + 3D for the impossible shots
Hero visuals and feature explainers produced with AI and 3D — angles a camera can't reach (battery internals, the swap sequence), at a fraction of a studio budget.
03
Engineered, not just designed
Built in Framer with custom code: a scroll-scrubbed product film, flip-counter live stats and an interactive swap-station map — the motion that signals world-class.
The Design Language Fonts, colour & pattern — the system the site is built on
Typeface
Ride the change
Clash Grotesk
Display • Headlines
Earnings, uptime, range.
DM Sans
Body & UI
Earnings, uptime, range.
Kalam
Handwritten accent
Typeface
Spiro Blue
Navy Blue
Volt
Cream
Patterns
The benchmarks set the bar.
Spiro clears it.
Launch the website →