India among top 3 markets for Hyperloop, says CEO

Hyperloop One sees India as among the top three markets for its super-fast transportation solution and is ready to invest "billions of dollars" in the country, CEO Rob Llyod said.

The US-based company, which is hopeful of launching the prototype within next three to four months, is ready to invest "billions of dollars" if India evinces interest and provides conducive environment.

"India for hyperloop is among the top three markets in the world ...It may have the strongest economic case in anywhere in the world because of the population density and lack of infrastructure... If 'Make in India' is a priority you need to build infrastructure," Lloyd told PTI in an interview. He said the company is in talks with the government as well as companies for some routes that could be built on public-private partnership. The Los Angeles-based company will decide whether "could it be India or it could be the Middle East" for launch of the first project.

The company is working on a technology that would use magnetic levitation in low-pressure tubes to transport people and goods at superfast speeds like 1,102 km Mumbai-to-Chennai via Bengaluru in 50 minutes or 334 km Bengaluru to Chennai in 20 minutes. This will be "first time in the world that any company will be demonstrating the first scale hyperloop sometime in the spring that will be the first production of hyperloop. The company has raised 116 million dollars of financing," said Lloyd. The Chief Executive Officer of the company said that since it is an expensive endeavour the company is currently raising more funds. "We are in the market... We would be raising another $ 200 to $ 300 million dollars between now and the summer. We think that the first scale prototype is required for some investors to see it at work... We are going to selling to governments, transportation authorities and this is not small thing, these are multi-billion dollar projects," LLoyd said.

Lloyd said the prototype was expected in next three to four months as a worldclass team of 200 employees was working hard at company's engineering facility in Los Angeles and number of employees will double to 400.