Meet Wild, a startup revolutionizing towing with an all-electric travel trailer

Electric trucks can lose over 50% of their range when towing — a dealbreaker for road trips. Wild's all-electric travel trailer solves this with a self-propelled platform that eliminates towing drag entirely, backed by TechNexus's investment alongside a vision for reimagining outdoor recreation.

Car shoppers in the market for an electric truck can spend over $100,000 on their EV. Yet despite the steep price tag, electric trucks experience challenges when it comes to one important aspect of truck ownership: towing. Towing a heavy load can decrease an electric truck’s range by over 50% , resulting in more charging stops, longer trips, and countless headaches on a long road trip. And these challenges aren’t exclusive to EV owners. Traditional gas-powered trucks can also see fuel efficiency slashed upwards of 50% when towing heavy loads — potentially adding thousands to your annual gas bill. But one startup believes it’s solved this pain point for gas and EV-powered vehicle owners alike with its electric trailer platform that propels itself behind the towing vehicle. Wild , a San Francisco-based startup that recently launched out of stealth, created a trailer with a built-in electric motor that allows drivers to achieve a normal driving range, as if they weren’t towing anything at all. Founded by twin brothers Riley and Justin Rodenburg, Wild raised a pre-seed round of funding from TechNexus Venture Collaborative, SOSV, Third Sphere, Mana Ventures and more. TechNexus invested in Wild through corporate partner Thor Industries, the world’s largest maker of RVs. Wild is unveiling its product at a Demo Day Tuesday, May 20 in San Francisco . Watching EV Truck Towing Challenges First-Hand Both Rodenburg brothers saw the range-loss issues electric trucks face during their previous experience at separate truck companies. Riley, an electrical engineer at Bollinger Motors, and Justin, a battery engineer at Rivian, saw these respective truck companies struggle when towing heavy loads. “It was surprising to me just how terrible the range of those electric trucks were when you started towing,” Justin Rodenburg said. “It was a big barrier for a lot of people to buy electric trucks, and we felt like there had to be a solution to improve that. And once we started digging into

By Jim Dallke at TechNexus Venture Collaborative