Curtiss Motorcycles has turned to crowdfunding to raise funds for development of its newest model.
A quick history lesson, in case you aren’t familiar with the backstory: Curtiss was formerly known as Confederate Motorcycles, and was responsible for some of the most far-out made-in-America motorcycles of the past 25 years. Founded in 1991, Confederate built some truly wild performance cruisers, particularly in conjunction with designer JT Nesbitt. Then the market for big-dollar custom bikes started to slow down; the Wraith carried a $92,500 MSRP way back in 2009, and that kind of price tag was hard to swallow after the 2008 financial crash.
Then, Confederate name was deemed inappropriate considering its historical connotations. Confederate became Curtiss Motorcycles, and started building an electric prototype, figuring the days of the internal combustion engine were in decline. That prototype was the Zeus, and now Curtiss is looking for money to pay for production.
Curtiss has turned to the Wefunder crowdsourcing platform to raise this money, selling stock in the company at $0.20 US a share, with minimum buy-in of $1,000 US.
The motorcycles are expected to begin production in 2020, with a 450-km range; the electric motor is reckoned to put out the equivalent of 190 hp and 145 lb-ft of torque. The MSRP is reckoned to be around $60,000 US, significantly less than previous models built by the company, but still a rich person’s toy, which is definitely going to raise eyebrows with potential investors, who may wonder why they’re being asked to help pay for the playthings of the rich and famous.
