In the most crowded cities of the world from China to India, many people rely on small motorcycles or mopeds for their primary transportation. With over a billion people entering the lower middle class globally over the next ten years, there is a big opportunity to serve a large number of people that would like to upgrade their transportation but will still have to deal with crowded roads and narrow streets.
The engineers at LIT Motors decided to think way outside of the box and design a vehicle that would not only be light and energy efficient, capable of running on either petroleum or electricity, but also serve this growing demographic by creating a vehicle that is designed for narrow crowded streets. They ended up creating that vehicle that looks nothing like a typical car.
We all know that cars have four wheels. But why? Two wheels are more efficient and the cost would be much less. However, two wheels for a car could be a big problem when you come to a stop—unless, of course, you have something to stabilize the vehicle.
LIT Motors has created a two-wheeled car that is self-balancing. Think of it like an extremely large motorcycle with a roof, doors, windows, steering wheel, and foot pedals. In addition to the driver, it has enough space for an adult passenger and bags that would be about the same space as the bags you can carry on a plane (roller bag, briefcase, a few bags of groceries).
To keep the vehicle from falling over, the engineers looked at how gyroscopes or tops stabilize things, and they put their version of the gyroscope inside the vehicle. So in other words, they took all of the stabilization problems at stop signs out of a two-wheeled car. While still in the prototype phase, LIT Motors is definitely creating a new platform for transportation that has broad implications in the world’s most crowded cities.
Given the mobile, social, virtual, visual revolutions that are taking place today and the many new tools that are now available, it is a good time to ask yourself; Is there a growing problem I could solve that would yield a big opportunity?
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