Wellington Electric bike company successfully closes $500k investment round
Summary
In a win for the EV movement (and the environment), Wellington electric bike company FTN Motion recently closed a successful $500k investment round, attracting significant international interest. Having just traversed the Te Araroa trail, a 3,000km route stretching from Cape Reinga to Bluff, co-founders and engineers Luke and Kendall returned to the stark reality of traffic jams and hours commuting each day. Thinking there had to be more to life than spending it in Auckland traffic, Luke Sinclair and Kendall Bristow tinkered away to find an alternative transport method during their commutes, starting with a prototype pushbike with strapped on batteries. Even better, the bike holds up to 30 litres of storage, making it the perfect vessel for transporting six six-packs of beer and 15 two-litre milk bottles.The idea is you plug in the Founders Series Streetdog battery for charging at night, right next to your phone. People just love the design and theres nothing out there like it!And after pitching the unique electric motorbikes to key private investors and angels clubs up and down New Zealand, FTN Motion closed a recent successful investment round of NZD 500,000, oversubscribed by at least $60K.This initial investment will be used by FTN Motion for R&D to bring the existing Streetdog prototype model to a full certifiable model, make the start-ups first key hires, and develop ten Beta units to sell to Wellington-based businesses in July 2021.