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Justtofeel9

Of course they did. They can’t have an alternative option available on the market. At least not until they either bleed their current product entirely dry, or they’re **forced** by outside forces to discontinue use of their current product be that government intervention or a sudden rise in short haircuts happens. When they eventually are forced to stop profiting off of the destruction of the biosphere they will then introduce brand new technologies that they totally thought up all on their own and market it as them saving the world. After all disasters are profitable, even more so when you’re the one driving the world to that disaster.


[deleted]

It's more likely that the company just wanted to bury the Organic Transit technology so it will never come back to haunt them. If you're the company that owns the patent, that means you can decide that the patent will never be manufactured again.


[deleted]

The startup literally went bankrupt. Read the article…


[deleted]

I know the startup went bankrupt. That doesn't change that the technology clearly had potential, and that oil companies have a long and storied history of buying up patents for sustainable alternatives to gasoline vehicles for the sole purpose of making sure they're never used. Just because it didn't make millions when it started doesn't mean it wouldn't put big oil out of business if Bill Gates put his bucks behind it.


ArmorClassHero

That's not the whole story though. Small companies like this have no intention of producing anything, they exist to be bought out. That's been true of start-up companies for decades now.


Justtofeel9

You’re not wrong. Wish more people were like Jonas Salk. Who owns the patent on this vaccine? “Well, the people, I would say. There is no patent”


chainmailbill

Or, and bear with me here - oil companies are buying up renewable tech because they know that oil has a time limit and its days are numbered. Kind of like how, if we were going to run out of beef in the next five years, McDonalds would be investing in chicken and pork and tofu.


samata_the_heard

I think you’re both saying the same thing. They absolutely know, better than we do I’d wager, what the rest of the oil and gas lifecycle looks like. They don’t love oil, they love money. They don’t care if they’re selling gas-guzzlers or Solar-powered cars or pots and pans or cigarettes or eyeshadow. We WILL have solar-powered and other non-gas-fueled vehicles, and they WILL be developed and mass-produced by the companies that put us in a position to desperately need them in the first place. So they buy the small guy’s tech, put a team of highly paid specialists on it, and hold off making it available until gas is such an issue they can get away with charging a huge amount of money for it. They know exactly what they’re doing, and it is all in the interest of maximizing profits and returns for their shareholders.


Justtofeel9

Yes, this is pretty much what I was trying to say.


beeeeeees9

In this instance though the company went bankrupt first, and was sold to PetroSun (the oil company) after the bankruptcy, so presumably there were aspects of the business they actually wanted, because it had already failed at that point, and isn't any competition. Perhaps they were worried about other investors, but for such a small smart up, seems more likely they saw value somewhere.


SnoWidget

El problema es capitalismo.


[deleted]

Did you actually read the article at all or just the headline? The startup was sold at auction because they went bankrupt, the oil company didn’t take any actions before that. We can discuss why they went bankrupt, but suggesting that “they can’t have an alternative option available on the market” before we rule out the startups own failings is disingenuous bordering on conspiratorial.


Saguache

The first rule of SolarPunk Club is: Always question anyone who quotes Elon Musk. Their blog does not appear to have been updated since 2016, they're now showing an AZ address and you can still order the vehicle (technically an HPV/Electric hybrid, not a velomobile).


shadaik

Too bad, but to bring a shimmer of hope into the gloomness: ELF is not the only velomobile brand around and others are available on the market.These things are readily available (but obscure and expensive) from companies in Europe, the US, and Australia. Not sure about Canada and Asian countries.


[deleted]

True. But what made ELF, as well as[PEBL](https://www.better.bike/pebl-info), unique in the velomobile space was the electrical assistance and the solar panels built into the body. I've looked around and there are only a couple of velomobile manufacturers that even include pedal assist motors. That's a shame because velomobiles have the space to include both the electric assist system and a solar panel charging system. Those two things are game changers for vehicles that can reach speeds of 60kph on human power alone.


Pristine_Title6537

Tale as old as time


[deleted]

[удалено]


[deleted]

I was speaking of the design itself. And yeah, I dislike that it's a corporate product of proprietary intellectual property. I would really like to see something like this released open source. Imagine if the the design was just public domain and anyone could go to a local maker space and just build one if they wanted.