A 31-year-old entrepreneur dubbed the ‘Croatian Elon Musk’ has designed an entirely electric hypercar capable of hitting speeds of 60mph in just 1.85 seconds.
Mate Rimac, who previously created batteries for companies including Aston Martin, Renault and Koenigsegg, named the pioneering 2,000 horsepower speedster after himself.
The Rimac C_Two produces 1,914hp from four permanent-magnet motors, which propel it to a top speed of 256mph, and hitting 60mph half a second faster than its rival, Tesla.
Even more impressive than its speeds, is Rimac’s ability to conjure a range of 340 miles from the car’s battery on a single charge, using battery and inverter wizardry.
Along with being extremely fast, the C_Two will have also boast the latest modcons including facial recognition and Level 4 autonomy, which means a fully driverless car capable of being used in heavily built up areas.
Such is the excitement about Rimac, described as a genius by a project leader at Porsche, that the VW Group owned luxury-performance brand purchased a further 5.5 percent share of Rimac, having already bought a 10 percent tranche in 2018.
‘I think [Rimac] is a genius,’ said Heiko Mayer, powertrain project leader for Porsche’s all-electric Taycan. ‘I think he is going to be a legend.’
Video: Rimac’s Concept Two hypercar with ‘groundbreaking’ technology
Explaining his success, Rimac told ZeroHedge: ‘It’s a lot of optimization, trying out things, experimenting, being fast, doing loops – idea, concept, simulation, detailed prototyping, again and again.’
In 2016, Rimac produced his Concept_One – which had 1,224 hp and was promptly crashed by British presenter Richard Hammond on a Swiss hillside.
Now, Rimac has around 600 employees and has ‘thoroughly outgrown its facilities.’
A new compound will be built on 54 acres of Croatian countryside ‘complete with 15th-century castle, located a few minutes away’ to allow the firm to continue its growth.
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