Hyperloop One closes: Elon Musk’s utopia continues to crumble

The dream of developing the Hyperloop, an ultra-fast means of transportation capable of traveling very long distances in just a few minutes, is becoming further from reality. Bloomberg reports that Hyperloop Onea project that Virgin and Richard Branson have supported for many years, officially dismantled and canceled.

The company has laid off most of its employees and is trying to sell its assets. While the firm’s closure has not been officially confirmed, the aforementioned media outlets indicate that Hyperloop One has already lowered the shutters at its offices in Los Angeles, California. The company is also trying to divest both its test site north of Las Vegas, Nevada, and its prototype vehicles.

At Hyperloop One, only a small group of workers remain on duty, albeit only for a few days. They were responsible for overseeing the marketing of the company’s assets until December 31st. Starting from 2024 launch will cease operations and its intellectual property will be transferred to DP World, a Dubai-based conglomerate that is positioned as its majority shareholder.

So another company that bet on Elon Musk’s vision to revolutionize transportation has failed. Hyperloop One joins SpaceXwhich at the end of 2022 dismantled the test track for its own version of Hyperloop and turned it into a parking lot for its employees.

Hyperloop One – the project that seduced Virgin

As we said, Hyperloop One, like other companies, was born with the intention of realizing the utopia proposed by Musk in 2013. However, the company itself attracted a lot of attention because it was one of the first to attract large investors. One of them was Richard Bransonleader Virgin Group.

The British tycoon joined the firm in 2017, three years after it was founded. Thus, the initiative was named Virgin Hyperloop Oneuntil in 2020 it just didn’t happen Virgin Hyperloop. The first achievements were very promising. Some of their plans were really ambitious, such as creating a development center in Spain.

In November 2020, Hyperloop One successfully completed its first test, carrying passengers at very high speeds for 500 meters. A small distance compared to what was promised to be covered when the system began commercial operation. However, the foundation seemed to be laid to demonstrate that the project was feasible.

In fact, in 2021, then Virgin Hyperloop CEO Josh Giegel, indicated that the firm plans to begin its commercial travel in 2027. The first routes will be established in India and Saudi Arabia, the executive mentioned. However, everything went downhill from there.

A project with high ambitions

The infrastructure required to run Hyperloop was monumental. After all, we are talking about capsules that promised to move at speeds of more than 1000 kilometers per hour. using magnetic levitation There is practically no air inside the tubes. But that wasn’t the only problem.

Virgin mentioned that the development of some key components – batteries, sensors, electronic power management systems – was not as fast as Hyperloop One required. Thus, this may negatively affect any forecast at its inception.

Although the true beginning of the end of Hyperloop One occurred in 2022, when the company changed its strategy and Lost Virgin support. The firm decided to move away from transporting passengers at very high speeds and to focus on solutions for transporting goods.

This led to the dismissal of almost half of the employees, since at the end of the year Richard Branson will remove his conglomerate’s brand from the project. Thus, one of the most ambitious projects to revolutionize the mobility of people around the world was left hanging by a thread. And just 12 months later, he says goodbye with great sadness and without glory.