yves behar's supercharged motorcycle design

Forrest North: The beginning of any collaboration starts with a conversation. And I would like to share with you some of the bits of the conversation that we started with. I grew up in a log cabin in Washington state with too much time on my hands.

Yves Behar: And in scenic Switzerland for me.

FN: I always had a passion for alternative vehicles. This is a land yacht racing across the desert in Nevada.

YB: Combination of windsurfing and skiing into this invention there.

FN: And I also had an interest in dangerous inventions. This is a 100,000-volt Tesla coil that I built in my bedroom, much to the dismay of my mother.

YB: To the dismay of my mother, this is dangerous teenage fashion right there. (Laughter)

FN: And I brought this all together, this passion with alternative energy and raced a solar car across Australia—also the U.S. and Japan.

YB: So, wind power, solar power—we had a lot to talk about. We had a lot that got us excited. So we decided to do a special project together. To combine engineering and design and ... 

FN: Really make a fully integrated product, something beautiful.

YB: And we made a baby. (Laughter)

FN: Can you bring out our baby? (Applause) This baby is fully electric. It goes 150 miles an hour. It's twice the range of any electric motorcycle. Really the exciting thing about a motorcycle is just the beautiful integration of engineering and design. It's got an amazing user experience. It was wonderful working with Yves Behar. He came up with our name and logo. We're Mission Motors. And we've only got three minutes, but we could talk about it for hours.

YB: Thank you.

FN: Thank you TED. And thank you Chris, for having us. (Applause)