Electric boat startup Arc revealed new images and a video of the pre-production version of the Arc One, a 24-foot-long vessel with a massive battery pack and an elegant design. The company has raised $30 million from a group of prominent investors that include Will Smith, Kevin Durant, and Sean “Diddy” Combs.
The company has already tested an early prototype, and the reveal of its pre-production version is meant to send the signal that the company is getting closer to customer deliveries, which are on schedule for this summer.
The specs of the Arc One have changed slightly since the company first came out of stealth last year. The boat will still have a top speed of around 40 miles per hour and can last about four hours under power before needing to be recharged — which the startup claims is plenty for a day out on the water.
But instead of a 200kWh battery pack capable of powering an electric motor with at least 475 horsepower, the boat will come with a 220kWh pack capable of powering a motor with over 500 horsepower. That makes the Arc One’s battery pack three times the size of a Tesla Model Y, said Arc CEO Mitch Lee.
“It’s a lot,” Lee said in an interview. “It’s actually split into two packs.”
Unlike with cars, a heavy battery pack is not a drawback for an electric boat, Lee argued. “The more a boat weighs, generally the more stable it is,” he said. “Especially for the water sports market, heavier boats means that you can throw a wake for somebody to wakeboard behind.”
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Lee said the Arc One will be a limited edition luxury cruise that will retail for $300,000. The company is hoping to follow in Tesla’s footsteps by selling a high-priced, low-volume boat from which it will use the revenues to fund the production of a lower-cost model.
“It’s premium, and it only appeals to a subset of people,” he said. “We want to get into the Model S-type of price range where it’s premium to the market.”
That could include other water sport vehicles, like jet skis, or even commercial vessels, like ferries, Lee said. “That is absolutely what we have in mind.”
wazup.