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[NEW2elec]

Well I know Team Powersports in Raleigh has been a pro electric bike dealer for some time and is close to your heart (and house) but he'd have to go west coast to start with.
The elephant in the room to me was when he was on stage with Harlan from Hollywood Electrics so we know they had to have met and talked at least about the possibility of selling through HE.  The fact that there has never been any mention of that pairing tells me something
was not right to not get that deal done.

The other good choice though out of CA is of course AF1.  The way they sell Zero parts directly to customers would be needed if Lightning really planed to sell bikes nation wide.

If they don't have at least a few dealers on board the best they can ever hope for is being a CA boutique shop.  Maybe that's good enough for them.  Who knows?

[ultrarnr]

NEW2elec, I agree AF1 Racing would be another good choice for a Lightning dealership and being in Texas they can cover the central part of the country. Then have TPS cover the east coast. At least to start out these two dealerships are key to getting sales outside of CA.  I have talked with some of the guys at Team Power Sports about Lightning and they are tracking all of the missteps that have been discussed in this forum. It is making it increasingly unlikely that they would become a dealer but maybe someday an agreement could be reached.

[princec]

At this point it looks very much like Lightning's best bet would be to attempt to sell themselves and their tech to Zero, and give Zero a mostly-developed supersports range ready-made.

Cas

[Richard230]

At this point it looks very much like Lightning's best bet would be to attempt to sell themselves and their tech to Zero, and give Zero a mostly-developed supersports range ready-made.

Cas

I am not too sure that Richard wants to sell his "tech" ideas.  He certainly has had plenty of opportunity to do so during the past 10 years that he has been developing his motorcycle designs.  I think he likes to talk, dream and tinker, but mass manufacturing motorcycles doesn't seem to be his thing.

[princec]

That would be the idea I think - sell the plans to Zero and let them figure out how to mass produce it, then enjoy a happy life designing new ones and tinkering. Maybe.

Cas

[enaef]

May be that Zero at the moment is occupied enough with the production of their own new bike(s).
As far as I was told, they were at least last year with the SR/F. The SR/S is standing in the line; it will be interesting how successfull that will be.
(I'd really be intersted in their selling figures ...)

We have interesting E-motorcycle times ahead ... Lightning, BMW, ....

[mistasam]

All I can say is, I hope Lightning is successful, because at the moment there isn't another bike that feels like this.  It fits right between a Zero SR and an Energica (and I don't mean an SR/F).  The Strike has good power, but isn't heavy.  It has the perfect sportbike riding position.  If for some reason Lightning closes tomorrow, I'll be sad, because nobody else is building a bike like that.

[HoodRichOG]

Bump.

What's the deal with Lightning these days?

I saw they were developing some sort of ridiculously looking enclosed motorcycle nobody needs or asked for.

Any news on the Strike, or did they call it quits after delivering a few half baked prototypes to customers?

[MVetter]

I posted an update in the public Facebook but I'll repeat it here. I went to Mike Corbin's factory in Hollister a couple days ago, and Mike informed me that Lightning was moving in to his factory. Apparently the people that own the building Lightning is renting in San Jose are selling it. As such Lightning is now renting a portion of the Corbin factory for their operations. I personally witnessed 3 people setting up shelving and attempting to figure out the best spot to set up CNC machines. There were also a handful of bikes in the corner which I did not approach or get a closer look at.

[HoodRichOG]

Thanks for the update. I wish Lightning actually gave updates about their production but I guess they don't actually care about selling bikes.

Also surprising to see Lightning not running out of money yet. Seems like they have a hell of a runway...