Stockholm-based electric boat maker X Shore has raised €1.5 million through a crowdfunding campaign on FundedByMe, which closed at midnight last night.
Founded in 2016, X Shore boats are fully electric and silent to combine minimal disruption of marine life with optimised user experience. Customisable through modular elements, the boat’s design offers an endless variety of features. The motor comprises an inverter designed to handle stress; a battery that has outstanding power to weight ratio; and a magnetic gearbox, which ensures silence and zero air friction. X Shore craft have a top speed of 40 knots and can hold up to 12 people.
X Shore has already brought its first range of fully-electric, silent boats to market, and the company’s flagship craft ‘Eelex’ will hit the waves in January 2019.
The capital raised through the crowdfunding campaign will be used for R&D, production, and the continuous development of X Shore’s boats.
X Shore had been funded in full by its founder and CEO, Konrad Bergström. With a proven track record of delivering returns, Bergström made his fortune through co-founding (and later exiting) Zound Industries, one of Sweden’s fastest-growing companies of all time.
At present, X Shore is operating in the high-end market – with prices starting from €225k per boat – to build its brand globally and take first-mover advantage.
With a business model which – without compromising profits – will allow for market price reductions with economies of scale, X Shore wants to make boating more democratic and accessible. Raising money through crowdfunding was part of its mission to build an inclusive community of investors and supporters that shares its belief that conversations about future mobility and increasing efficiency, while also reducing air and sound pollution, must also include the world’s waters.
“I am really excited to have our new crowd investors on board for the next phase of our journey,” said X Shore Founder and CEO Konrad Bergström. “I’ve put my own money behind X Shore because I want a better tomorrow for our oceans, and I’m confident that together, we can, and need, to accelerate positive change to realise this vision. Our goal is to fundamentally change how we travel at sea and it is incredible to see that so many like-minded investors have decided to back our mission.”