Gibbs Amphibians
AMPHIBIOUS VEHICLE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY PORTFOLIO FOR SALE OR LICENSE
Hilco Streambank is seeking offers to acquire or license the intellectual property portfolio of the creator and manufacturer of innovative and first-of-their-kind amphibious vehicles. The available assets include a sizable patent portfolio covering multiple product families worldwide, CAD files, bills of materials, test data, specifications, more than a dozen unique trademarks, and additional related materials.
The covered technology is pioneering in addressing a fundamental challenge in producing high-utility amphibians, namely, achieving high speeds on both water and land with minimal transition time. The developing company invested more than $200 million to solve fundamental engineering challenges related to creating a vehicle that improved existing “boat with wheels” or “car with propeller” solutions and successfully developed and brought to market three distinct vehicles, the Quadski, Aquada, and Humdinga, which have been sold around the world. A variety of additional prototype configurations, including a motorcycle, motorized trike, all-terrain quad, and additional concepts have been fabricated.
These amphibious vehicles have been sold to customers internationally, a significant number of which are still in use today, serving as tender to yachts, providing passengers with the ability to reach shore via any beach or boat ramp rather than a dock. Some of these vehicles are serving in a “surf-rescue” capacity or as patrol vehicles in coastal areas. Some of the vehicles remain available for purchase on the secondary market, still maintaining attractively high resale values. Click here to watch Top Gear’s Jeremy Clarkson race the Quadski across Lake Como against co-star Richard Hammond driving an Alfa Romeo on land.
The patent portfolio contains hundreds of registered, provisional, and pending patents, covering a number of geographies, including the U.S., China, Europe, and the U.K., and protecting several key technology areas. The key technology areas that provided differentiation in the end user experience are:
Concept Patents
- Include multiple land-based drive systems including 1-wheel (motorbike), 2-wheel (car), and 4-wheel (ATV, 4×4) systems.
Wheel Retraction & Steering Patents
- Enable complete removal of the vehicle wheels from the water via a mechanized retraction system, thereby reducing drag and enabling high water speeds.
- Unlike more common mechanisms of addressing drag, which principally reduce the contact between wheels and water, this technology fully eliminates the contact.
- Covers wheel retraction, suspension, and steering parts required to reposition wheels quickly and precisely with each transition.
- Land drivetrain and water jet propulsion remain consistently engaged, allowing rapid transition between land and water modes in under 5 seconds. This unique design can be used with electric or internal combustion motors.
Cooling Patents
- Provide solutions to the choice of air cooling for land-based engines where the air intakes either add drag or provide a hull integrity challenge in marine mode, or water cooling, which is typical for high-powered marine motors but useless on land without a steady water supply.
- Deal with issues involving heat and exhaust management to maintain emissions requirements and eliminate the shock of quenching heated elements when entering the water.
Powertrain Patents
- Cover the prime mover, speed change transmission, and drive shaft systems, which enable rapid transition from land to water and back to land.
- Cover multiple land-based powertrains with an elegant solution for packaging and minimal time spent in transition.
- Broadly cover applications across both electric and internal combustion motor configurations.
Hull & Dynamic Patents
- Cover the various designs required to accommodate the wheels in transition while maintaining maximum hydrodynamic and aerodynamic performance both in water and on land.
- Address—in conjunction with the entire patent portfolio and design—the management of the different loads placed on the hull when on land versus in water.
Additional Patents
- Cover common controls for both land and aquatic methods of propulsion, rather than traditional amphibious systems, which typically utilize two separately engaged sets of controls.
- Patent portfolio consisting of hundreds of patents in jurisdictions, including the U.S., China, Europe, and the U.K.
- More than a dozen unique trademarks registered across numerous territories, including the U.S., China, Europe, and the U.K.
- CAD files
- Test data
- Bills of materials for Quadski, Aquada, and Humdinga
- Related materials and information
The assets are being offered for sale or license via private transaction on behalf of the developer and manufacturer of the technology. Additional confidential information is available in a virtual data room. Please contact Hilco Streambank to learn more about this opportunity and sale process or to request a non-disclosure agreement in order to access additional confidential information.
