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Battery-Powered Three-Wheeler Is Something New On The Road

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Arcimoto Inc. has taken significant steps lately toward getting its battery-powered, three-wheeled “Fun Utility Vehicle” into mass production, but it still has a long way to go.

“We realize, we’re only reaching the starting line,” Mark Frohnmayer, Arcimoto president, said as he officially opened the company’s future factory here in Eugene, Ore., last month. At the same time, Arcimoto took delivery of a giant, laser-powered cutting machine to make steel parts.

Shortly afterward, the company reached another milestone when it retailed its first small batch of essentially hand-built vehicles, including some to its own employees, friends, and families.

Company photo

The company says it has more than 2,000 customer deposits of at least $100 each, to reserve a production vehicle. The target base price is $11,900 suggested retail.

Most notably of all, in September the company raised net proceeds of about $18 million in a “Regulation A” public offering on NASDAQ. Fittingly, its stock symbol is “FUV.”

The company plans first to develop a proper assembly line that builds “replicable” vehicles, then to ramp up production in 2018, with a goal of reaching an annual rate of at least 10,000 units at some point in 2019. Arcimoto Inc. paid journalist travel expenses for the factory opening.

Despite the start-up vibe, Arcimoto was actually started back in 2007. In the last decade, the “Fun Utility Vehicle” has evolved through seven prototypes. The first production vehicles are based on the eighth generation.

“Every time we got to a new milestone and we would put a new prototype on the road, we would say, ‘Ehhh, not yet.’ Then we would look around and say, ‘Has anybody else cracked this thing yet? I guess not.’ Then we would just have to put up to the next step,” Frohnmayer said.

The basic concept for “this thing” is battery powered, minimal, eco-friendly, functional but basic transportation, he said in an interview – the opposite of a gas-guzzling, seven-passenger SUV with only one occupant. Obviously the largely open-air FUV isn’t for everyone, but it is a sporty ride, and capable of light errands around town.

A couple of prototypes ago, Arcimoto switched from a steering wheel to motorcycle-style handlebars for the driver. Frohnmayer said switching to handlebars was a breakthrough in terms of saving weight and making the vehicle simpler to build.

“Three years ago, we ditched the steering wheel and pedals in favor of handlebar controls. We lost more than 600 lbs., about 40 percent of the total,” he said.

On a drive through this small city, a bare-bones model got a lot of thumbs-up signs, especially from kids. Lots of people, even in Arcimoto’s home town of Eugene, asked, “What is that?” Finally, in one passing car, the driver answered their passenger’s question: “It’s an Arcimoto.”