Formerly |
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Company type | Private |
Industry | Transportation Technology |
Founded | June 1, 2014[1] |
Founders | |
Defunct | December 31, 2023 |
Headquarters | |
Key people |
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Hyperloop One, known as Virgin Hyperloop until November 2022, was an American transportation technology company that worked to commercialize high-speed travel utilizing the Hyperloop concept which was a variant of the vacuum train. The company was established on June 1, 2014, and reorganized and renamed on October 12, 2017.[2]
Hyperloop systems were intended to move cargo and passengers at airline speeds but at a fraction of the cost. They were designed to run suspended by magnetic systems in a partially-evacuated tube.[3] The original Hyperloop concept proposed to use a linear electric motor to accelerate and decelerate an air bearing levitated pod through a low-pressure tube. The vehicle was to glide silently at speeds up to 760 mph (1,220 km/h) with very low turbulence.[4] The system was proposed to be entirely autonomous, quiet, direct-to-destination, and on-demand. It would have been built on elevated structures or in tunnels, free of at-grade crossings and requiring less right of way than high-speed rail or highways.[5]
Virgin Hyperloop made substantive technical changes to Elon Musk's initial proposal and chose not to pursue the Los Angeles–San Francisco notional route that Musk envisioned in his 2013 alpha-design white paper. It demonstrated a form of propulsion technology on May 11, 2016, at its test site in North Las Vegas.[6] It completed a 500 m (1,600 ft) Development Loop (DevLoop)[7] and on May 12, 2017, held its first full-scale test. The test combined Hyperloop components including vacuum, propulsion, levitation, sled, control systems, tube, and structures.[8]
On November 8, 2020, after more than 400 uncrewed tests, the firm conducted the first human trial at a speed of 172 km/h (107 mph) at its test site in Las Vegas, Nevada.[9][10] However, in February 2022, the company abandoned plans for human rated travel and instead focused on freight, firing more than 100 employees amounting to half its total workforce.[11][12] In November of that year the company decided to rebrand, reverting to the name, Hyperloop One.[13]
It was announced on December 21, 2023 that the company will cease operations on December 31, 2023 due to a number of factors including financial challenges, high interest rates, initial backing and support,[14][15] as well as to its failure to secure any contracts for building a working hyperloop system; it began selling its assets and laying off remaining employees.[16] According to The Verge, all of its intellectual property would shift to its majority stakeholder, major Dubai port operator DP World.[17]
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