BMW backs Venna electric motorcycles as it eyes a move into the growing off-road e-bike market

BMW Motorrad has invested in electric motorcycle startup Venna, a company whose laid-back Californian identity is about as far removed from Munich's traditionally straight-laced corporate culture as it gets.

Venna specialises in high-performance electric motorcycles, with an initial focus on off-road riding. The investment will see the two companies combine their expertise in selected areas, with BMW bringing its experience in development, quality and industrialisation, while Venna retains its independence and ability to develop products at its own pace.

There is, however, a slight catch. While Venna talks confidently about its electric motorcycle ambitions, it has yet to, as far as we can find, put a production bike into customers' hands. 

The company was previously known as Flux Performance, where it developed the Primo electric motocross prototype, a machine that attracted attention for its claimed performance and technology. Despite earlier production ambitions, the Primo never made it into customers' garages, and Venna has yet to announce a firm date for its first production model.

That makes BMW's investment an interesting vote of confidence, as the German brand is effectively putting money behind a company with prototype development experience and plenty of ambition, but no proven track record of bringing a motorcycle to market. 

Turning an impressive electric dirt bike into a commercially viable product is a very different challenge, and it's one where BMW's manufacturing experience could prove invaluable. Whether Venna can turn its enthusiasm into something customers can actually buy remains the big question. Financial details of the deal, including the size of BMW's stake, have also not yet been disclosed.

What's particularly interesting about the partnership is the contrast between the two brands. BMW Motorrad has built its reputation around precision engineering, technical development and a distinctly German approach to doing things. Venna, meanwhile, appears to have arrived from a rather different school of thought. In fact, most of the Venna webpage reads like it’s been penned by Point Break’s Bodhi.

Sounding like a love letter to Southern California's surf, skate and motocross scenes, the Venna website talks about building a community around its motorcycles, hosting events at its Hollywood base and creating machines for riders who want to escape the everyday.

The website's final line sums it up nicely: "We're building a bike and other rad s**t."

Like, it’s cool and totally epic, maaan, but it's also hard to imagine that sentence making it into a BMW Motorrad internal strategy document.

Behind the laid-back branding, however, is a serious engineering operation. Venna is the successor to Slovenian electric motorcycle developer Flux Performance, which attracted attention with its Primo electric motocross prototype. The company is led by Marko Ukota, who says BMW's investment will help accelerate the development of its technology and move towards industrial-scale production.

BMW Motorrad CEO Markus Flasch says the partnership will help the company access new technologies and reach different groups of riders, particularly younger customers increasingly viewing motorcycles as recreational machines rather than everyday transport.

Venna says it wants to develop high-performance electric motorcycles across multiple riding categories, although neither company has announced specific models or launch dates.

For now, the pairing of Munich engineering and Californian motocross culture makes for an interesting combination. Whether BMW's influence will eventually tame Venna's more rebellious personality remains to be seen.

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