After gaining her Bachelors in Industrial Design at Sweden’s Umeå Institute of Design, Fanny Jonsson stuck around to earn a Masters in Transportation Design. In what is the dream situation, her Masters thesis—an electric ATV aimed at farming, done for her internship at electric mobility company Cake—led to Cake giving her a job to finish realizing the project.
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Called the Kibb, it’s “an electric all-terrain vehicle that will gently move around the land, with and without a human driver. The vehicle is designed to, at all times, make as little impact as possible, while still providing the user with the power and capability that’s needed.”
Jonsson conceived of the Kibb after spotting a gap in the market. Farming requires machinery, and that machinery typically requires pouring fuel into them. Electric options are few. “Agriculture is one of the industries that contributes to the most greenhouse gas emissions in the world. This is slowly killing our soil and prevents healthy growth, so the industry is, at this point, slowly killing itself. Today, the access to non-pollutant transportation and machines is very limited.”
The Kibb can be used as a mule/carry vehicle, with a wide, flat platform atop it. Alternatively it can be fitted with a seat and handlebars—I imagine these are quick-release, though the project page doesn’t say—to accommodate a human rider.
“In order to tackle various tasks that are required at a ranch or farm, modularity is an important aspect throughout the design. The modular body of the Kibb will have different attachment points to allow for compatibility with a wide variety of ATV accessories. It can also act as a mobile power station, providing the farmer with a new best friend to perform the day to day duties associated with regenerative agricultural life.”
“With its level of autonomy, the Kibb can do many tasks by itself,” the description says, though they do not lay out the use cases. “This could free up time for the user to do tasks on the ranch or farm where supervision is needed.”
The project made an impression on Stefan Ytterborn, CAKE founder and CEO. “Not only was the result from Fanny’s thesis an incredible achievement, but it was such an impressive reflection of the core CAKE values, that it was impossible not to turn the Kibb into reality.”
“When I started to build out the concept, I had real world challenges in mind, and explored heavily where there is the most unlocked potential on the market,” writes Jonsson. “Starting from the core CAKE DNA combined with a new vehicle type was truly exciting, and now that CAKE will continue developing the Kibb and give everyone the opportunity to follow the progress from my renderings and concept to reality is honoring as well as a great tool to take zero emission, regenerative farming to the next level.”
Source: core77