Italian Lego-like Electric Vehicles are Driving the Revolution for Our Future Transportation System

3 min readJun 10, 2021

In many countries, public transportation brings up images of long waiting times, frequent stops, packed interiors, and air pollution. A seemingly fictional idea is to create a completely new kind of public transportation system that can solve all of the current problems we face. In fact, companies in Europe are now in the race to develop better means of transport in the form of Electrical Vehicles (EVs) that can be combined with intelligent routing to improve efficiency, reduce pollution and improve the passenger experience.

The technological innovation for EVs is driven by concerns for pollution emission, cost, sustainability, and more. (Source) Autonomous shuttles are a form of EVs entering the scene, with French companies Navya, Olli, and Easymile behind their developments. These companies are valued highly, take Navya for example, it had an IPO valuation of €190 million. (Source)

A growing Electric Vehicle market size of over $1,000 billion!

The EV market is rapidly growing, with many new companies hoping to capture market shares. The global electric vehicle market size may reach $1,212.1 billion by 2027! (Source)

In 2019, the global EV market was valued at $162.34 billion. Within this enormous market, Asia-pacific actually occupies the biggest share. It was the highest revenue driver with an $84.84 billion valuation in 2019, and it is estimated to grow to $357.81 billion by 2027. (Source)

Lego-like vehicles and “car-jumping” is the next solution

A startup called NEXT in Italy, targeting the $1,000 billion EV market has developed modular vehicles instead of autonomous shuttles and combined with an advanced smart transportation system. NEXT has been supported by the exponential hub Paradigma, which selects and supports technologies with high impact and added value.

Every single vehicle would be considered as a module like a lego block. The transportation of these vehicles would be achieved through the concept of “car jumping” — with each car module being able to join and detach with others on stranded city roads like the assembly and disassembly of lego blocks. You can watch Video 1 and Video 2 to understand more about modular vehicles and “car-jumping”. The modular design of the vehicles will allow public transport companies to optimize the fleets based on the needs, improving efficiency. The modularity will also reduce the cost of manufacturing.

New York University has conducted independent studies on this concept and found that with the use of modular vehicles there will be “60% less distance traveled by the entire fleet to bring to destination the same number of passengers compared to taxi”.

Modular vehicles can therefore be considered as the “Wildcard” of transportation because they can behave as shared cars, taxis, minibusses, buses, vans, and large trucks — all depending on the needs of the customers and simple reassembly of the lego-like modules.

Can NEXT race to be the next unicorn of valuation over $1B?

Would new technologies and concepts such as “car jumping” ever win the confidence of the people in order to realize their potential? Or would such innovations just be another science fiction we will tell our kids? NEXT being a startup not yet listed, has been supported by the exponential hub Paradigma which selects and supports technologies with high impact and added value. Can it be the next unicorn of valuation over $1B? The race to a better future for roads will soon unveil these answers once the green light is shown.