Pioneering boat startup Arc Boats is tackling a new category for electric boats with its first “mass-market” model. The company calls its Arc Sport the most advanced wake boat to hit the water. The new boat combines aerospace engineering, EV (electric vehicle) technology, and software with 226 kW·h of battery capacity, a 425-kW motor, and more than double the torque of most premium wake boats.

Arc says that the sports boat market is a $4-billion industry in dire need of modernization, with even today’s premium wake boats relying on outdated technology. In just three years, co-founders CEO Mitch Lee and CTO Ryan Cook have assembled a team of experts from the worlds of aerospace engineering, EV, marine manufacturing, and software from veterans from SpaceX, Tesla, Rivian, Lyft, and the marine industry like Brunswick and MarineMax.

The company pitches the Sport as everything users expect in a wake boat except it is “faster, smarter, more reliable, easier to use, and cheaper to operate.” Its first mass-market boat move delivers the next frontier of electrification to the marine industry starting at $258,000, outperforms more expensive wake boats, while also saving users thousands of dollars each year in operating expenses.

Its Arc Sport uses advanced in-house software that continuously improves with over-the-air (OTA) updates to integrate and improve the boating experience through two modern displays. Unlike gasoline boats, Arc says that the Sport gets more intelligent—and more performant—over time.

The Sport is equipped with enough battery and ballast to deliver an exceptional wake-shaping experience. With the press of a button, the auto-retractable hardtop tower provides an adjustable tow point through chop, rain, or wind. A large entertainment screen allows riders to adjust their music through JL Audio speakers and view their journey through video recaps and stats. And, once back at the marina, the bow and stern thrusters make it easy to dock the boat. At every step of the journey, the Arc Sport provides an exciting upgrade to the world of wake boating.

By going electric, Arc says that the Sport fundamentally improves the experience of owning and operating a boat.

Dramatically fewer moving parts eliminate most maintenance needs and winterization. Overnight charging powers users’ time on the water without lugging gasoline cans down to the dock or paying hundreds of dollars for that gasoline.

The electric powertrain makes the Sport easy to use, without the traditional learning curve of ownership. Hitting the water is as simple as turning on the boat with a touchscreen and leaving the dock. Plus, it’s quiet, allowing users to connect with nature and enjoy conversations at all speeds thanks to the quiet propulsion.

The launch of the new Sport coincides with the end of the Arc One program. In January, the company announced the final delivery of its groundbreaking first boat. In just over two years, Arc went from its founding to designing, manufacturing, testing, and delivering its electric boat. Deliveries of the Arc One began in the spring of 2023. Along the way, it learned valuable lessons as it readied for its mass-market boat.

Unlike traditional boat manufacturers that buy most of their parts off the shelf, company execs knew that approach wouldn’t work for Arc. It needed to vertically integrate for the Arc One, designing and manufacturing many systems in-house. This enabled the battery pack, electrical system, and software to function in harmony and optimize performance for customers.

An example of this is the Arc One’s custom 220-kW·h battery pack, at nearly three times the capacity of that in a Tesla Model Y.

“Nobody’s put a battery pack this large in a boat of this size before,” said Cook.

Arc structurally integrated the batteries into the hull of the Arc One for “unprecedented EV performance for watercraft.”

While most of our in-house innovation was planned, some of it came out of necessity. After multiple third-party gearboxes malfunctioned and delayed the delivery of the first Arc One, the team adapted and created its own.

“Our boat simply had too much continuous power for outsourced gearboxes to handle,” Cook said.

In just four months, the Arc team quickly engineered a custom gearbox that integrates with the One’s high-performance motor.

Since its founding in 2021, Arc successfully delivered the Arc One to customers, secured more than $100 million in funding, and grew the company from 3 employees to around 100—and it is expecting to double that number by the end of this year.

It has not only grown from a small team of rocket and EV engineers to a larger crew of boat builders, but also the size of its operations. Arc began building electric boats in an 8,000-ft² warehouse, but in December announced its move into a 150,000-ft² factory and headquarters in Los Angeles. The company chose Los Angeles for its new operations because of the shared talent pool of innovation there alongside industry leaders like Rivian and SpaceX.

The first Sport development unit is already being tested across the water at top speed. Production model deliveries begin this year, and customers can reserve the Arc Sport now.