It all starts with surfing which evolved in skateboarding, snowboarding and other related sports. History says that skateboarding was born in the 1950’s in California. When the surfers, searching for fun in the days of no surfing waves, they attached roller skates to a small board and transferred the wave riding feeling to the streets. About 40,50 years later, electric skateboarding was the logic evolution and again in California history was made.
Louis Finkle from California ( nicknamed Electric Louie ) is the creator of the wireless electric skateboard. He is an electronics innovator and an extreme sports enthusiast. Combining his passion in these two fields helped him create the first wireless electric skateboard in 1997. At that time his boards were revolutionary, they could operate in high speeds and had a good stability. On the downside, they were really heavy and the price was high ( some of the boards weighted more than 35 kilos ( 80 pounds ) with a price of 1200 $ ). Few more years had to pass before the technology of the batteries and the components evolved enough and lightweight products at an affordable price came to the market.
“Altered skates company” which continued to improve Louie’s electric skateboard, manage to manufacture boards which are already half the weight of the first ones ( less than 20 kilos ( 42 pounds ) receiving more interest from the customers.
Today thanks to the pioneer companies: “Boosted Boards”, “Evolve Skateboards”, “Zboard”, “Metroboard”,”E-Glide”, “Yuneec”, “Mellow Boards”, “Inboard”, “Acton”, “Enertion”, “Carvon”, “Nextboards” and more, the electric boards became an affordable technology with great specifications.
“Boosted Boards”, based in Mountain View, California, begin their story in 2011 when the founders: John Ulmen, Sanjay Dastoor and Matt Tran decided to gather their knowledge to create, as they say: an electric skateboard that will make city transportation easier, faster and a lot more fun. In 2012 they launched one of the most successful “Kickstarter” campaigns at that time. Their boards continue to be a synonym of the electric longboard.
“Evolve Skateboards” are based in Australia. The people behind Evolve are both old school and new generation skateboard and longboard enthusiasts. Jeff Anning is the creator of these high-quality electric longboards and in 2012 their first boards were sent to customers who had preordered in anticipation around the world. Soon after, all their boards had completely sold out and received a great feedback.
“ZBoard” is also a Californian company with a revolutionary electric skateboard. Their board is controlled by the rider’s weight and there is no need for remote control – “just lean forward to go and lean back to stop”
They started their history in 2009 with a three-wheeled board which passed through a lot of improvements to reach today’s appearance. In 2012 during their “Kickstarter” project they received a lot of good suggestions from customers which helped them to shape their board.
“Metroboard” company is located in Washington, USA. Their founder Ilan Sabar is a skateboarder and mechanical engineer who built his first electric skateboard in 2003 in his garage in Portland. He continued developing his boards through the years. In 2012, Alan Shibata joins his team and they put together their skills to manufacture electric boards with amazing specifications.
Building electric boards since 2004 “E-Glide” have all-terrain models that can go over rough and broken surfaces giving the riders the possibility to explore areas unreachable for most other electric skateboards. Riding in the desert on “Burning Man” festival their boards were noticed by many visionaries who help this lifestyle grow.
“Mellow Boards” is a German company building an electric skateboard kit that can be mounted to almost any normal skate and longboard. Their motor is a hub motor inside the wheel. The founders Johannes and Kilian and the Mellow team promote this alternative transportation by touring all over Europe and USA to let the people test ride their creation. They really push the things forward for Europe to follow California and legalize the electric boards.
All these pioneer companies have their contribution, thinking about our planet, working hard and improving our quality of life by giving us the possibility to commute while enjoying the ride : )