Lightship cofounder Toby Kraus in front of the company’s battery-powered RV. Photos by Max Scheinblum.
Lightship will soon be docking at campsites around America.
The Broomfield-based, solar-powered RV maker will deliver its first product – with a price tag of $250,000 – in the coming weeks.
It is the first time a non-plug in or propane trailer home will hit the market, said co-founder Toby Kraus.
“We’re not just making an EV for EV’s sake. The experience of living on the inside and not having to deal with a generator is better,” Kraus said.
The RVs are made at Lightship’s 32,000 square-foot manufacturing plant at 1765 W 60th Ave. There will be 50 total in the first batch, most of which have been bought.
Lightship has a 30,000-square-foot factory in Broomfield.
The startup, which has 80 employees, will also start production later this year on three other versions ranging from $125,000 to $184,000.
Lightship’s trailers have an open, “studio apartment” feel, Kraus said, and include all the standard features like a kitchen, couches, cabinets and a bathroom.
While most traditional mobile homes are around six-and-a-half feet tall, Lightship’s rig has an extra foot of headspace. It sleeps up to six, using a combination of lofts and pull out couches.
“You’ll get somebody in there who’s like 6’4” and they’re like, ‘Holy s***. I’ve never been able to stand in an RV bathroom before,’” he said.
The company also says it solves another key issue.
“The problem with electric vehicles, they all have an Achilles heel, which is when you tow with them, you basically lose all of your range,” Kraus said, noting that the current options see mileage shrink by up to two-thirds. “How we solve that is we make the RV super aerodynamic.”
Krause said Lightship makes its product “slippery” with a trapezoidal-like design that can go up and down. The trailer contracts to six-and-a-half feet when towing so it hides behind a truck, negating any drag. Then, when you’re at the campsite, you can pop it back up to its standard 10 foot height.
That alone cuts the range problem in half, Kraus said. To close the rest of the gap, the first model also moves itself, effectively operating like an e-bike.
“We get a big battery… and that powers a motor, which is on the rear axle, and propels the RV so it’s not just being pulled,” he said. “It’s supporting its own mass and drag. And so what the tow vehicle experiences close to no force on the hitch.”
The trailer also has two kilowatts of solar panels on the top – the equivalent of six Tesla Powerwalls, Kraus said. This enables up to a week of off-grid camping, and the unit can also charge a car.
“The solar is really sized more to support all of the living loads,” he said, noting that batteries could also be used as a generator when stationed at home. “So if you want to go camping and you don’t have any hookups that’s one of the benefits.”
Bigger mobile home companies like Thor, which is an investor in Lightship, have tested out EV concepts in the past, Kraus said. But none have ever taken a product to market.
He also said Pebble, a company which is coming out with an RV this spring, is a competitor. But Kraus said they don’t use solar panels and the interior is closer to the traditional mold.
“Our products are pretty different. I would actually like to see us both be successful,” he said, adding that about 1 in 10 Americans own an RV, which is the second largest vehicle market to cars.
Lightship has been working on developing a prototype since launching in 2020, and the company first showcased the trailer in 2023. It also has an office in San Francisco, where co-founder Ben Parker lives.
Parker, a Nantucket-native, named the business after the shipping vessel that used to traverse to and from the Massachusetts island.
Lightship has raised around $60 million from investors, according to SEC filings.
Kraus spent five years at Tesla, where he was a part of the finance team that oversaw a $465 million low-interest loan from the Department of Energy. He also oversaw production of the Model S – the second car that Elon Musk’s company put out in 2012.
Lightship only sells direct to consumers off its website. The startup has a showroom at the Broomfield facility and is adding one in San Francisco.
“We’re definitely not following the typical RV playbook. We don’t sell through dealers,” he said.
Kraus says that even though profitability has been historically difficult for electric-only vehicle makers, Lightship’s niche will prove valuable.
“If you look at companies like Rivian, it’s a cool company, great product. But they’re years in and not only are they not profitable, they’re not even making gross margin,” he said. Tesla didn’t have a profitable year until 2020, nearly two decades after its 2003 founding.
Kraus said Lightship will likely launch new RV lines every two to three years, with cheaper options coming in the future so it can be more mainstream.
But they won’t have the $40,000 price tag he said the average rig comes with – Kraus wants to make sure his company is a “premium brand.”
“The RV industry is a bit different in that it is possible to make a profitable business at lower volume,” he said. “So you don’t have to get to hundreds of thousands of units…We’re not trying to sell 10,000 RVs next year. We’re trying to build a sustainable business next year at lower volume.”
Nathan DePuy, marketing manager, and Toby Kraus inside the RV
