Show Notes
Jona Christians is the co-founder and CEO of Sono Motors. He is on a mission to build a community-supported enterprise that makes solar-powered electric vehicles accessible to everyone. He and his co-founders started their enterprise straight out of school; making good on Jona’s life-motto that changing things for the better often means taking matters into your own hands.
The Sion, their second prototype, is more than a car. On the one hand, it is a sustainable mobility concept - free of fossil fuels. On the other, it aims to change the way we think about the role of mobility and the ubiquity of cars in our daily lives. With the car’s solar panels, it partly powers itself; and once fully charged, its bi-directional charging technology can power other devices. Its design promotes shared ownership and ride sharing.
In 2019, when Sono Motors was looking for funding, the leadership decided to not go with investors, but instead turned to the community to pull together and co-invest in the future of the company. With the pre-sales of the Sion, they managed to raise 50 million euros in crowdfunding. Since then, they have continued working with the community via road shows to inviting design suggestions.
Sono Motors’ disruptive and innovative approach is changing mindsets in the automotive industry and has won them several awards: namely, the Entrepreneur of the Year in 2020 from Ernst & Young, and Most Innovative Start-up in Mobility from Forbes.
UN Sustainable Development Goal: Affordable and Clean Energy Sono Motors: https://sonomotors.com
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