How an electric surfboard company could float into a $100M business

Brunswick (BC) had its media day, showcasing their new boats and power technology at Chelsea Piers in New York City. One of their recent acquisitions is a company called Fliteboard. The company manufactures "eFoils", an electric-powered board that uses a battery and propeller to create smooth movement on the water. Yahoo Finance Senior Reporter Pras Subramanian joins to discuss what he saw out in the water and how the exciting new technology could transform into a profitable business.

Video Transcript

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Yes so I had the Brunswick's media day today. Brunswick, the biggest recreational boat maker in America. They had their media day today and Chelsea Piers Marina here in New York City. Saw some big boats, we rode some boats, talked to the CEO.

But one of the things that caught my eye was this thing called the it's called an e-foil. It's a thing that basically is like a hovercraft that you stand on like a surfboard, but it has a propeller powered by electric motor and a battery. And essentially, what happens is you-- there you go. See, there you go. You see, hover above-- so this is me filming, I filmed tthis. This is actually a video. There you go, see.

You basically hover above the water like that. And what happens is that this--

BROOKE DIPALMA: Is it in the Hudson?

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Yeah. Yeah. What happens is that because you're above the water, you actually don't get any of the effects of the wake or the waves. And you can actually go on a smooth ride in choppy water anywhere. A lot of people use these things to go across island to Island, things like that. Basically, what-- this is a growth area for Brunswick, they think-- they bought this company called Flyboard. They think it's going to be $100 million business if not more in a not too distant future.

JOSH SCHAFER: Wow.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Now, you ask me how much it costs.

BROOKE DIPALMA: Yeah.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Costs to run 10 grand. But they want they want to be able to rent them out in Marinas. So like a jet ski, you rent it out for a couple hours.

JOSH SCHAFER: So I see two logical use cases there, right? A, if you just have a lot of money and you have a lakehouse, I could totally see buying one of those the same way people buy-- the same way people buy, but I'm thinking, Pras, I was thinking about choppy waters. I don't know how much I trust it. It's super choppy ocean, right?

BROOKE DIPALMA: You're skeptical.

JOSH SCHAFER: But if you have a lakehouse, a lot of people use jet skis like that at their nice lakehouse, right? You put it on the dock, then you can just go pop over somewhere. You can pop over, get a drink, et cetera. That's like super ideal.

And then the rental market.

BROOKE DIPALMA: Yeah.

JOSH SCHAFER: You go on vacation, and they have one of these. And you only have to pay 100 bucks, and you get to use it for a certain amount of minutes. You want to check that thing out. I would totally rent that, 100%.

BROOKE DIPALMA: OK, see, I know myself, and I know that I won't balance as gracefully as the person--

JOSH SCHAFER: The guy made it look so easy in the video.

BROOKE DIPALMA: I just know myself, I'm the guy to fall off.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: He was sitting on at one point. He's running like this. He was sitting and uses a little joystick. And he's just driving around like this. Yeah. He's hanging out.

BROOKE DIPALMA: That's insane. As soon as you go, does it fall over though?

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Well, it has like a gyroscope that kind of keeps it up. So you-- it's always balanced. OK, so anyway, I guess that's that, but--

BROOKE DIPALMA: I mean, I'm not buying. A $10,000? That's ridiculous.

JOSH SCHAFER: All right. Next time we send props to the boat show, he's got to try that out for us. We got to go--

BROOKE DIPALMA: I want to see you in a--

JOSH SCHAFER: Maybe it's still going on. We got to get Pras over there to try it out, but that's going to do it for us over here today, guys.