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Greetings Mission Motors fans:

There has been some discussion on the Web recently about Mission Motor’s racing schedule in 2010 and we wanted to officially clarify our plans.

We were able accomplish two major milestones for our motorsports program in 2009: competing in the inaugural TTXGP, and shortly thereafter setting an AMA speed record at the annual BUB Motorcycle Speed Trials at the Bonneville Speedway.

Racing is the ultimate engineering crucible, and we used this experience to understand how our motorcycles perform at the limit.

Since then, our engineering team has been focused on meeting our production goals for the Mission One Premier Limited Edition, which we are planning to deliver to customers in mid-2011. It is an exciting and intensive process, and, as a result, we will not be racing at Infineon or TT Zero at the Isle of Man this June.

Azhar and his team have been greatly supportive of Mission Motors and electric motorcycle racing as an emerging sport over the last two years.  We support them in their pioneering work to expand electric racing worldwide.

We commend Infineon Raceway for their work in putting on this event, and showing their support for electric racing, the future of motorsports.

We look forward to getting back to the track soon. It is our goal to unveil our second generation race bike late this season. In the meantime, we wish all the teams and series the very best of luck.

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Greetings Mission Motors Fans! We just got back from the Green California Summit in Sacramento, a showcase of interesting green technologies and initiatives that are the cornerstone of California’s “green revolution.”

Our team had a great time checking out the many innovative companies in attendance. We also enjoyed fielding questions about Mission Motors, many of which focused on the Mission One Premier Limited Edition we had on display.

One attendee was particularly interested in the Mission One: Governor Schwarzenegger, who is an avid motorcyclist, made sure to stop by our booth to check out the bike he’d heard so much about in the run-up to his show visit.

He was intrigued by the look of the bike, the video footage of the bike at the track, and the sound of the motor (one benefit to electric bikes is that you can twist the throttle inside of a convention center).

After hearing that the handbuilt-in-San Francisco bike was available now for presale, he left us with the phrase “I’d like to visit your factory,” as one of his aides took a note of the Governor’s request. We’ll keep you posted.

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Are you passionate about solving difficult engineering problems? Are you committed to developing well-executed and fully-realized products?  Would you like to change the world?  If so, Mission Motors is looking for you.  We are hiring Electrical Engineers and Software Engineers for roles in our San Francisco office.

On the software side, we are looking for people with experience in deeply embedded real-time software, embedded Linux systems, control systems, web services, and databases.  In EE, we are looking for a power engineer with experience designing high-voltage (~500V) inverters and battery chargers.  The right candidates have experience and interests in lithium batteries, electric motors and controllers, motorcycles, and speed.

This is an engineering team that is second-to-none.  We are looking for people who are passionate about their work, and passionate about making a difference.

This is an opportunity to join a company that is changing the world.

Visit http://www.ridemission.com/company/careers for a more detailed description of who we’re looking for to fill these roles.

As we find ourselves well into 2010 we wanted bring you up to speed about some changes in the company and some exciting things we have planned over the year.

Earlier today we issued a news release announcing that our long-time COO, Jit Bhattacharya, will be taking on the role of interim CEO of Mission Motors as we begin the search for a more permanent CEO (see www.ridemission.com/company/news ). Jit’s background in engineering, his experience as an MBA and former manager, and the fact that he has been with the company since early 2008 made him the obvious candidate to ensure that no momentum was lost as Mission Motors moves into the next phase of growth. The Board of Directors is actively looking for a CEO as we move towards production with the commercialization of the Mission One.

Forrest North, my co-founder, and the man with the dream that became Mission Motors, has been integral to everything this company has built since its inception. Under Forrest’s leadership we put ourselves on the map in 2009 with our company launch at TED, our participation in the first zero-emissions grand prix at the Isle of Man, and claiming the AMA electric motorcycle land speed record at the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Mission Motors would never have come to be without the incredible fortitude of Forrest, and his absolute confidence that it was possible to create an electric superbike that rivals the performance of gasoline sportbikes. As the company shifts gears and prepares for production, it became clear that saddling Forrest with the day to day burden of leading Mission Motors was not playing to his strengths. Forrest’s visionary force will continue to propel Mission Motors forward into the future through his role on the Board of Directors.

Mission Motors is stronger than ever as we move into 2010. Beyond our potential partnership with motorcycle manufacturer Zongshen (see “Chinese Motorcycle Powerhouse Zongshen Eyes Mission Motors for Strategic Partnership”), we have exciting plans for the year ahead, including more details about our team’s commitment to electric motorcycle racing in 2010, our plans for new products, and our ongoing passion to design and deliver the fastest production electric motorcycles in the world.

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Selected from hundreds of entries, the iconic design of the Mission One Premier Limited Edition draws accolades on both sides of the Atlantic. Mission is pleased to be recognized with the prestigious 2009 GOOD DESIGN™ Award, a 2009 Spark™ Award, and selected as a finalist for the 2010 Brit Insurance Design of the Year. It’s a great way to close out 2009 and welcome the opportunities of 2010.

2009, Spark™ Award

Says Peter Kuchinki about the prestigious Spark™ Awards: “We wanted to break out and support sustainable design, advanced transportation and universal design.”

http://www.sparkawards.com/Galleries/09_Entries.htm?appid=2258

2009, GOOD DESIGN™ Award

Presented by – The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design & The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies

The GOOD DESIGN award is the “world’s most prestigious international awards program for new industrial design and graphics.”

Now in its 59^th year, the Museum’s historic GOOD DESIGN™ program was founded in Chicago in 1950 with the participation of early modernism’s most formidable designers.

Please visit The Chicago Athenaeum’s website for more information on the award: www.chi-athenaeum.org

2010, London Design Museum Short List for Design of the Year .

The Mission One Premier Limited Edition is vying for the top spot in the transportation category. Category winners will be announced in a few months so stay tuned for updates. . .  http://www.designsoftheyear.com

Alex Newsom, the curator of the exhibition, took note of important trends amongst the nominees: “It’s interesting to see how themes of sustainability and social responsibility have emerged in this year’s nominations, revealing both the importance of economical and social change in the design over the last 12 months. It’s a broad field and an exciting celebration of design.”

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Hello Mission Motors fans!   We’re hopping on the Mission One and heading south to visit all of the fans of the future of motorcycling living in the LA area!

Please join us at the 2009 Long Beach Cycle World International Motorcycle Show, December 4th and 5th at the Long Beach Convention Center.

Find us in the “Welcome Center” where we will have the Mission One on display.

We had a great experience at the San Mateo show. There are a lot of folks who came from far and wide just to see the incredible Mission One– we were quite flattered.   Big thanks to our gracious hosts at the IMS, Kurt, Trevor, Bill, and everyone else.

We hope to see you there!

Drop us a line in the comments if you’re going to stop by.

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Hello Mission Motors fans– please join us at the 2009 San Mateo Cycle World International Motorcycle Show, November 20-22nd at the San Mateo County Expo Center.

Find us in the “Welcome Center” where we will have the Mission One on display.

This will be the first time that the bike will be on display to the public, fresh off of its racing and speed record successes at the Isle of Man and Bonneville Salt Flats. See the bike, meet the team, and experience firsthand the next evolution of motorcycles.

We hope to see you there!

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Edward R. Murrow established a tradition of calling up Stanley Marcus each holiday season to inquire about the most unique gift offered by Neiman Marcus so that he could mention it on his radio show. Famously, the retailer once offered a Black Angus bull that could be delivered either live or in steaks, with a sterling silver barbecue cart. This began the unique tradition of Neiman Marcus offering a list of “Fantasy Gifts” to their loyal customers.

This year, Mission Motors is pleased to announce the inclusion of the Mission One in the 2009 Christmas Book’s Fantasy Gift List. Neiman Marcus has offered limited edition Ducati’s, Maserati’s and Bombardier Learjets in the past, but the Mission One will be the first electric motorcycle to be featured by Neiman Marcus, which makes this partnership even more historic.

The Neiman Marcus Mission One will have a production series limited to just 10 motorcycles. Like our 2010 Premier Limited Edition, the motorcycle will reach a top speed of 150 miles per hour and allow for 150 miles of driving between charges, but there are some important differences: The 2010 Neiman Marcus Mission One will feature an exclusive gloss black & anthracite color scheme and forged magnesium Marchesini gold wheels. Included in the package is a visit to the Mission Motors headquarters in San Francisco and an on-track instructional session with one of Mission’s professional racers at a racetrack in the Sonoma wine country.

Mission Motors is very pleased to introduce new customers to the world of electric performance.

Stay tuned for new images of the Neiman Marcus Mission One.

Mission Motors began with the dream of building a high performance electric sportbike that represented no compromise compared to existing gasoline sportbikes. In fact, we wanted to make an electric sportbike that was better than gasoline bikes. This has been our singular goal from the founding of this company over two years ago: to build the future of motorcycling.

Now we think of things a bit differently. This is no longer the future of motorcycling; it is the present.

We are extremely pleased to be able to share with you some of the fruits of our labors. This demonstration represents the culmination of a lot of hard work by the highly talented Mission Motors team.

We show in this compilation of footage a few firsts. An electric sportbike that can power wheelie at 80MPH. An electric sportbike that turned in 150MPH runs at Bonneville (with individual runs as high as 161 mph), shattering the land speed record for electric motorcycles. An electric sportbike that can pound lap after knee dragging lap at Infineon raceway. An electric sportbike that accelerates so smoothly and handles so nimbly that it is like nothing else on the market, delivering torque smoothly from 0MPH to 150MPH all in one gear.

This is not a one-off exotic race vehicle. This is a production prototype of our first motorcycle, the Mission One, to be delivered next year. The bike will only get better from here as we continue to develop the product and improve the powertrain.

Here at Mission Motors, we’ve been hard at work building a bike so extraordinary, that even a year ago it would have been impossible to believe it could be built. And it still wouldn’t be, save for the tenacity of one of the most gifted and talented teams ever assembled.

Let the era of the electric superbike begin.

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Last Tuesday, we hosted the inaugural talk of our Mission Motors Lecture Series.

At Mission Motors, we believe in the power of knowledge in creating change.  And, we believe that knowledge is most powerful when shared. It is in that spirit that we decided we wanted to create a series of public talks dedicated to the things we care about here at Mission Motors.  Credit goes to Jason Hui, our intrepid summer intern, for making this lecture series a reality.

The Lecture Series speakers will come from a wide variety of backgrounds, with the common thread being their experience in creating change in the fields of business, design, sustainability, technology, and social innovation.

For the inaugural lecture, we were honored to have Nathan Shedroff speak on the intersection of Sustainability, Business, and Design.  He gave a fantastic and thought-provoking lecture on how business must embrace sustainable design strategies in order to thrive in the next decade.  What Nathan was suggesting is that business-as-usual strategies aren’t just bad for planet, but that they will soon begin to aggressively cut into a company’s bottom line.

Sustainability strategies around substitution, dematerialization, informationalization were proposed as ways that companies can begin to make real changes.  But he also argued that thinking of sustainability as purely an environmental strategy was a dead end– adding “social capital” and “financial capital” to the “natural capital” that we often associate with sustainability is where the scope of the strategies start to become big enough to face the real world of business, and the daunting challenges that we face.  It was further proposed that corporations are a key lever in the sustainability equation, and that corporations will have arguably the most critical role amongst the three pillars of Business, Government, and Civil Society in creating real change toward a sustainable society. We here at Mission Motors couldn’t agree more.

Nathan Shedroff is the author of the book, Design is the Problem: The Future of Design Must Be Sustainable. He is also the founder and chair of the ground-breaking MBA in Design Strategy program at California College of the Arts (CCA) in San Francisco. This program melds the unique principles that design offers business strategy with a vision of the future of business as sustainable, meaningful, and truly innovative—as well as profitable.

Nathan is one of the pioneers in experience design, an approach to design that encompasses multiple senses and requirements and explores common characteristics in all media that make experiences successful—and has played an important role in the related fields of interaction design and information design. He is a serial entrepreneur, works in several media, and consults strategically for companies to build better, more meaningful experiences for their customers.  Nathan speaks and teaches internationally and has written extensively on design and business issues.

By creating this lecture series, we hope to learn, but we also hope to provoke thought and conversation that expands our understanding of the world and the way it works.  We believe that it is important that this experience extend beyond the walls of our company.

We are looking forward to our next lecture!

Let us know if you’d like to attend the next one by emailing us at admin@ridemission.com , subject: Lecture Series.