To ease the pressure of heavy traffic in Paris, two French makers are building an egg-shaped water taxi. This rental boat is called SeaBubbles. It can be connected to a smartphone, controlled by robots, and can cross the Seine.
Water taxis pass through the River Seine and sound very romantic. Now its founders want to make it a reality for the benefit of Parisians and tourists. Last Thursday, the founder of SeaBubbles stated that the company had raised 500,000 Euros for this rental boat to allow water taxis to use. Its investors include the drone manufacturer Parrot SA, Partech Ventures and the French government agency BPI. At the end of this month, the company will also carry out the next round of funding to develop SeaBubbles App and build a dock where the taxi will be docked.
The company's goal is to build a battery-powered egg-shaped boat for rent, which can transport at least five passengers at a time. The company plans to operate the taxi boat in the summer of 2017.
In addition to funding around, the startup is also seeking support from Uber, the construction company Vinci SA and luxury goods maker LVMH. However, as of now, the company has not announced the results of negotiations with these companies.
Company co-founder Alain Thebault said:
Many cities have idle rivers and there are great opportunities. What SeaBubbles needs to do is to seize these opportunities.
The founders of the company were Anders Bringdal and Thebault. The former was a surf player, and the latter was a mathematics-loving sailor. Together, they designed a Hydratere floating yacht and broke the world's fastest speed record of floating ships in 2009. They stated that SeaBubbles has now received support from Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo. Anne Hidalgo is behind the development of environmental protection, so it is not surprising that SeaBubbles are environmentally friendly.
SeaBubbles can now carry 5 people, including a crew member. But the company’s goal is to make SeaBubbles completely unmanned after a few years. However, whether the charterer can transport Parisian people and tourists on the Seine still needs to get through the government supervision. At present, the French government does not allow vessels without any sailors to sail on the Seine. However, automakers, battery distributors, software engineering companies, etc. have expressed strong interest in SeaBubbles, and they are willing to help SeaBubbles really go into the water and achieve mass production.
The company’s plan is to sell SeaBubbles to individuals, businesses, cities, and countries, but the founders are now discussing whether the company needs to own the rental business or open source to third parties.
Now, SeaBubbles plans to use the funding from the seed round as a prototype for building a ship. The prototype is 4.3 meters wide, 2.3 meters high and can reach 29 miles per hour. Bringdal and Thebault plan to showcase the SeaBubbles prototype at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January 2017.
In the process of creating the world's fastest sailing boat, the Hydroptere, Bringdal and Thebault accumulated a wealth of experience, which also laid a good foundation for the birth of SeaBubbles. In 2009, when Hydroptere broke the world record, its guests included Alphabet co-founder Larry Page, Prince Albert of Monaco and astronaut Bertrand Piccard.
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