Navier is quietly expanding across the high seas. The San Francisco-based start-up, cofounded by former NASA researcher and MIT engineer Sampriti Bhattacharyya in 2020, plans to deploy 100 electric vessels across the Maldives to enable emissions-free travel between airports, resorts, and local islands. As Navier puts it, it will serve as “an ultra-efficient, black-car fleet of the sea.” Navier said it signed a contract valued at approximately $100 million with JIH Global—a Dubai-based investment firm behind some of the top hospitality projects in the Maldives—to roll out the vessels over the next three years in what could become the first large-scale test of electric maritime transit infrastructure. Maldives-based developer HARIM will be the operator. Conventional gas-powered ferries and boats are currently the primary mode of transportation in the Indian Ocean archipelago, carrying residents and tourists to locations spread across 35,000 square miles of ocean. Navier’s battery-powered water taxis represent a cleaner, more efficient alternative..
