从磁悬浮滑板到会飞的汽车，这家创业公司在下一盘很大的棋

    去年秋天，小创业公司Arx Pax在Kickstarter上的一次众筹活动几乎引爆互联网，其项目简直好玩到逆天——它要开发一款像电影《回到未来》里那样的，真正的悬浮滑板。更让爱好者疯狂的是，滑板界传奇人物托尼•霍克用它在镀铜U型场地上，表演了一段悬空半英寸的滑行视频。就这样，10块悬浮滑板以1万美元一块的高价被很快抢购一空。

    不过对Arx Pax而言，悬浮滑板只是他们迈出的第一步。该公司首席执行官格雷格•亨德森介绍称，实现悬浮滑板的技术是一种全新的磁悬浮手段，Arx Pax将其称作“磁场架构”，它将给许多领域带来革新。

    现有的磁悬浮系统需要同时在运行物体和轨道上安装复杂的电磁波系统，每英里的成本可能高达数千万美元，而Arx Pax的新系统很有可能要便宜一大截。

    尽管磁悬浮在运输中安全、快速、高效的优点得到了广泛共识，但由于成本问题，政府和交通运输部门在采用磁悬浮技术上进展极为缓慢。在2012年的一份报告中，美国联邦运输管理局发现，高昂的成本是美国采用磁悬浮技术的主要障碍，他们用了“吓人”一词来形容这项花费。

    但Arx Pax的磁力引擎完全被安置在悬浮物体中，所需的基础设施只是一块能导电的平面，比如在悬浮滑板演示视频中使用的镀铜U型场地。这意味着人们能够以低廉的成本迅速架设各种规格的悬浮系统。更令人佩服的是，这种平面还可以做多种用途。比如说，在镀铜表面铺上一层沥青，这种道路就能同时支持磁悬浮汽车和传统汽车。

    Arx Pax开发的系统还自带引擎，可以利用磁力产生推力，并控制方向，所以它并不需要铺设特定轨道。该公司开发了一款叫做Manta Ray的微缩版悬浮汽车，它能灵巧地以“之”字形转弯，就像遥控汽车一样。亨德森认为，它可以发展成“一种新型的汽车，采用混合动力，既可以按照常规方式行驶，也可以悬浮行驶，兼具汽车的灵活和火车的高效。”

    然而，让悬浮汽车上路这一充满未来感的梦想仍面临不少障碍。Arx Pax的“悬浮引擎”非常耗电，每举起一公斤的物体都需要40瓦的功率。老牌磁悬浮开发公司Magnemotion的前任工程副总裁詹姆斯•韦勒表示：“每公斤耗费40瓦功率，这在交通运输领域是致命的缺陷。”相比之下，Magnemotion试验的M3磁悬浮系统举起超过1万磅的重量仅需100瓦功率。

    而且，Arx Pax系统只能从装载电池中获取能量。韦勒说：“电池质量的确正变得越来越好，不过可能还需要做出海量改进”才能实现亨德森愿景中的那类混合动力磁悬浮汽车。Hendo悬浮滑板也只能维持7分钟的滑行时间。

    但Arx Pax这项技术最大的竞争优势或许在于其可扩展性和灵活性。尽管公司正在自行生产Hendo悬浮滑板，但他们接下来打算授权其他公司使用这项技术。

    亨德森表示：“我们的目标是——将这项技术交给那些能为我们不了解的问题想出全新解决方案的人。”Arx Pax通过在Kickstarter上的众筹，售出了约700套名为The White Box的开发工具。亨德森提到，正开发的一个解决方案是：可用于清洁房间的悬浮推车，它能解决传统推车上轮子和活动部件都是污染源的问题。

    亨德森表示，已经有许多大公司有意收购Arx Pax，不过他们还是决定自己保留公司控制权。“我们不想被摆在某公司的货架上，被收购或被控制，更不想让这项技术受到任何人为的限制。”（财富中文网）

    译者：严匡正

    审校：任文科

    Last fall, small startup Arx Pax nearly broke the internet with a Kickstarter campaign that many thought was too good to be true—it was building a real-life hoverboard, straight out of Back to the Future. The ten Hendo boards being offered (for $10,000 each) sold out swiftly, in part thanks to a video of skate legend Tony Hawk zipping across a copper-plated halfpipe, a half-inch off the ground.

    But the hoverboard is just a first step for Arx Pax. According to CEO Greg Henderson, the technology that makes the hoverboard possible—a new kind of magnetic levitation that Arx Pax labels Magnetic Field Architecture—has wide-ranging, transformative implications.

    Arx Pax’s system is potentially much less expensive than existing maglev systems, which rely on complex electromagnetic systems in both vehicle and tracks and can cost tens of millions of dollars per mile.

    Despite its widely acknowledged advantages in safety, speed, and efficiency in transit applications, governments and transit authorities have been extremely slow to adopt maglev due to cost. In a 2012 report, the Federal Transit Administration found that these costs, which it characterized as “intimidating,” were a major barrier to maglev adoption in the U.S.

    But Arx Pax’s magnetic engine is entirely contained within the object being levitated, and the only required infrastructure is a conductive surface, such as the copper-lined halfpipe used to demo the hoverboard. This means systems of any scale could be laid quickly and cheaply. Even more impressive, the surface can be multi-use—for instance, a roadway consisting of a layer of asphalt over copper could accommodate both maglev and conventional vehicles.

    The Arx Pax engine can also generate thrust and directional control magnetically, so it doesn’t need a track for guidance. One of Arx Pax’s prototypes is a scaled-down hover vehicle called the Manta Ray, which zigs and zags as neatly as a remote control car. According to Henderson, this points towards “a new type of vehicle, a hybrid vehicle that can drive conventionally, or can hover . . . [with] all the freedom of a car and all the efficiency of a train.”

    But this futuristic dream of roads full of flying cars faces some obstacles. Arx Pax’s hover engine is power-hungry, needing 40 watts of energy to levitate one kilogram. According to James Weiler, former VP of engineering for longtime maglev developer Magnemotion, “40 watts per kilogram is a killer in terms of transportation.” By contrast, the M3 maglev system that Magnemotion piloted was able to levitate over 10,000 pounds with a hundred watts.

    And all of the Arx Pax’s energy has to come from on-board batteries. “Batteries are getting better,” says Weiler, “But you probably need an order of magnitude improvement” for the kind of hybrid levitating car Henderson envisions. The Hendo hoverboard offers a ride time of only 7 minutes.

    The scalability and flexibility of Arx Pax’s technology may be its greatest competitive advantage. Though the company is building the Hendo hoverboard itself, its plan going forward is to primarily license its technology.

    “Our goal,” says Henderson, “is to put this technology in the hands of folks to come up with new solutions to problems we don’t even know about.” Arx Pax sold about 700 of its developer kits, The White Box, through its Kickstarter campaign. One such solution that Henderson mentions is hovering carts for clean room applications, where wheels and their moving parts are sources of contamination.

    Henderson says that Arx Pax has already entertained buyouts from larger companies, but chooses to remain in control. “We didn’t want to end up on someone’s shelf, bought up or stifled, [with] this technology limited in some way.”