CEO Eelco Van Weerdhuizen joined the team and became a co-owner in the business. Eelco is Dutch but has lived in Norway for more than 20 years with his wife and kids. He was a friend of Sigurd from the mountain bike community and liked the project so much that he quit his old job in the oil and gas industry to join Exotek AS. 2021 was spent prototyping. We joined a new production-partner in the company Simek AS outside Ålesund on the west coast of Norway. Simek became our sole provider of frames and laser cut parts. They also had room for us to start a small assembly hall in the same building as they reside in. Most of the year was spent working on different designs and testing the product.

The team was extended with Adrian Aakre as a workshop assistant and Eelcos wife Marlou in logistics. We sold the first 5 Exoquads to friends of Sigurds from the Spinal cord injury community here in Norway. Toward the end of the year, we hired two mechanics, Magnus and Andreas, and started small-scale production. We hired Kjetil for sales. Kjetil is a wheelchair user and a friend of Sigurd from before. We also got an investor onboard who believed in us and helped us with our financial runway toward full production.

The product matures and sales have started gaining momentum. The Exoquad team receives a lot of attention and becomes nominated as the industrial startup company of the year at the IDC awards. We gain more knowledge about the product and keep on working with iterations and improvements. We win another startup contest that leads to more investor interest and we receive more funding. Feedback from the customer group is very positive and we realize that there is a market for our products. We also introduce The ExoGravity Bikepark model in 2023. Joachim joins the team to help Mattias in research & development.

Growth continues, and sales have increased since 2023. We need more room and move to new localities in the neighboring town of Aalesund to ramp up production. Sales are picking up in Norway, but the market is relatively small, so we decided to start the buildup of a dealership network in Europe. We entered Sweden, Belgium, the UK, France, Germany, and Iceland first. Plans for further expansion commence, and more dealers are lined up for 2025. We hired Nora as coordinator and Einar as a Commercial Director to help us expand the business abroad. Sigurd relocated from sales to marketing to handle the brand building and social media channels. Exotek sees substantial growth from 2023 and has clear goals for 2025 to expand the business and sell the Exoquad globally. Plans are also underway to expand the product portfolio and make further product upgrades.