2025 could go down in history as the year in which Italian three-wheelers changed skin. While Piaggio definitively closes the doors of the Ape production in Pontedera (transferred to India forever), Fiat turns on the engines of its first three-wheeled electric vehicle. It is called Fiat TRIS, and from its name alone it seems to want to play with that tradition that has made the Ape an immortal symbol of our automotive culture.
It's not nostalgia, it's strategy: take the best of the past and project it into the electric future of urban mobility. And judging by the first reactions, the operation could be a success better than expected.
When the engineer dreamed of flying
To truly understand what the Fiat TRIS debut means, we need to go back almost eighty years. It was the 1948 and Italy was struggling to emerge from the rubble of the war. Corradino D'Ascanio, the aeronautical engineer who dreamed of making people fly with his helicopters, found himself instead designing something that was meant to run on the roads. Post-war regulations had prevented him from continuing aeronautical research., and Enrico Piaggio offered him a different challenge: to create a vehicle for the country's economic revival.
D'Ascanio never imagined that this “rib of the Vespa” would become a social phenomenon. The Ape cost 170.000 lire, a considerable amount if you consider that the average annual income of Italians was around 139.152 lire. But it had a unique characteristic: It could carry 200kg of cargo with a 125cc engine, consuming very little and reaching places where traditional vans could not reach.
The economic boom on three wheels
The 1952s transformed the Ape from an experiment to a mass phenomenon. In XNUMX theApe C, with a capacity of 350 kg and a finally closed cabin. It was the vehicle that small Italian businesses were missing: big enough to be useful, small enough to be cheap, simple enough to be repaired anywhere.
Piaggio understood early that he was not just selling a means of transportation, but a tool for social emancipation. The slogan “Ape, the vehicle that helps you earn” (formidable) it wasn't marketing, it was a promise kept. Thousands of small traders, artisans, street vendors built their fortune on those three wheels that hummed through Italy during the economic boom.
Italian creativity never stopped: in 1961 theApe Pentarò, a miniature five-wheeled articulated lorry capable of carrying 700 kg. In the 1970s the Ape Car arrived, which with its larger cabin directly challenged traditional vans, while in the 1980s Giorgetto Giugiaro completely redesigned the lines of the vehicle.
The goodbye that no one wanted
The end came almost unnoticed. Last December Piaggio announced the cessation of Italian production of the Ape, moving everything to India. The new European regulations on safety and emissions would have required investments too expensive for a market that was now reduced. Too expensive to adapt a project born in 1948 to the standards of 2025, when airbags and assisted braking systems have become mandatory.
Paradoxically, while Europe says goodbye to the Ape, In India the vehicle is experiencing a second electric youth. From the 2019 Piaggio produces the Ape E-City, a fully electric version with battery-swap technology that allows you to replace the flat battery in a few minutes. The Indian electric vehicle market, which was worth 2019 million dollars in 71, is expected to exceed 700 million in 2025.
Fiat TRIS: the electric heir you wouldn't expect
And this is where it comes into play. Fiat Professional with a move that smacks of strategic genius and emotional marketing at the same time. The TRIS is not an attempt to copy the Ape, but to collect its spiritual legacy by projecting it into the future of sustainable mobility. Designed by the Fiat Style Centre and produced in Morocco, TRIS is initially designed for the African and Middle Eastern markets, where the demand for light commercial vehicles is constantly growing.
The technical specifications tell a story of electric pragmatism: 9 kW motor, 6,9 kWh lithium battery (the same as the Fiat Topolino), 90 km range and a maximum speed of 45 km/h. It can be recharged with a normal 220V household socket, from 80% in 3 hours, to 100% in less than 5 hours. No wallbox, no complications.
Three configurations for a thousand uses
The real intelligence of the project lies in its modularity. TRIS is available in three versions: cabin, with flatbed and with box. It can carry a Euro pallet and has a payload of 540 kg., dimensions that make it perfect for last mile logistics that is becoming crucial in the era of e-commerce.
The dimensions are designed for the urban environment: 3,17 metres in length, turning radius of 3,05 metres. Quite compact to slip into the alleys of African medinas, roomy enough to be useful to small entrepreneurs that Fiat wants to conquer with accessible leasing formulas.
Fiat TRIS, Europe is the next target
Olivier Francois, CEO of Fiat, makes no secret of its European ambitions: “We believe its potential goes far beyond: Europe could be the next stop, because this intelligent and sustainable solution speaks a universal language”. TRIS is already approved according to European standards, with three-point seat belts, automatic LED headlights, reversing buzzer and all required safety devices.
Coming to Europe is not a matter of “if,” but “when.” European cities are introducing increasingly large zero-emission zones, and electric micromobility is becoming a necessity as well as a choice. Electric three-wheelers are an ideal solution for those who need to transport goods without the limitations of heavy vehicles.
The Future of Urban Micromobility
TRIS comes at a time when urban mobility is undergoing a seismic transformation. Cities are desperately looking for alternatives to diesel vans for last-mile deliveries, and light electric vehicles seem like the logical answer. It's not a casuality that other manufacturers are also experimenting with similar solutions, from 3D-printed tricycles to electric quadricycles with battery-swappable systems.
Fiat's strategy is clear: start from emerging markets to test the product and perfect the assistance network, then land in Europe when the infrastructure and demand are mature. It's exactly what the Ape did in the 1950s: it first conquered rural Italy, then the cities, and finally the world.
Fiat TRIS, when the circle closes
There is something poetically right in the fact that while the Ape says goodbye to Italy to continue its history in India, another Italian brand picks up the baton of electric three-wheelers. As we have highlighted in this in-depth analysis on the mobility of the future, the transition towards more sustainable vehicles is not just an environmental issue, but a social and economic one.
TRIS could become for electric mobility what the Ape was for post-war reconstruction: an instrument of economic democracy, a vehicle that allows anyone to start their own business without prohibitive investments. The difference is that this time the fuel is non-polluting and the future looks much greener.
Seventy-seven years after that first Ape that left the Pontedera workshops, the Italian three-wheelers are ready to write a new chapter. Electric, modular, sustainable. Corradino D'Ascanio, who dreamed of making people fly, would perhaps approve: sometimes the best inventions are born when you are forced to change direction, and the future always finds a way to pay homage to the past, even when it seems to have forgotten it.
