This fireside chat recap is from FreightWaves’ Supply Chain Meets FinTech event on Wednesday.
FIRESIDE CHAT TOPIC: Creative fundraising in the capital markets.
DETAILS: Mark Hanchett took an unusual path to fundraising for his electric work truck and battery startup. He sold shares directly to individuals in small amounts through little-known, regulated crowdfunding designed for small startups. Now on the cusp of going public, Atlis Motor Vehicles sees many of its 20,000 small investors becoming customers.
SPEAKER: Hanchett is CEO and founder of Atlis Motor Vehicles.
BIO: After spending more than 10 years in product development engineering body camera and Taser products for law enforcement at Axon, Hanchett pivoted to combine his engineering technology expertise with his love of trucks. He founded Atlis Motor Vehicles in 2016 in his garage, near Mesa, Arizona, to meet the need for an electric work truck.
KEY QUOTES FROM MARK HANCHETT:
“It’s been an interesting journey in that the way we took this, or the way that I approached this problem, was that in this market, you have to go out and you have to prove that customers really want what you’re building.”
“We operate as a public company even though we’re technically still private today. And with that comes massive preparation to be a public company and to operate like a public company and to go through all those diligence points of a public company, which is very interesting.”
“We are building a company and a product and developing one in an industry that has a tremendous amount of competition and incumbents, but the amount of information we have on our customer base is incredible. We know where they’re at, what their hobbies are, we know what their focus is.”