Brisbane-based Benzina Zero has blitzed a crowdfunding campaign after raising $1 million in nine hours, powering the electric motorbike and scooter producer close to its $1.5 million target as it looks to expand its footprint in the lucrative European market.
The crowdfunding campaign, which was officially launched on the Birchal platform today, has been strongly supported by existing customers. It also follows a $1.2 million raise last year in a debt-for-equity swap by lenders to the company which counts Domino’s and Pizza Hut among its clients.
“People who buy our bikes particularly are the ones who are likely to invest in the company, and that’s across both our Domino’s partners and contractors which is really exciting,” Benzina Zero co-founder Ben Silver tells Business News Australia.
“We’ve got less than a third to go in the crowdfunding campaign but we expect to round it out prior to the end of the period which is scheduled for 10 July.”
Founded in 2019 by Silver and Joe D’Ercole, Benzina Zero produces a range of electric mobility products including mopeds, scooters and bikes.
While the consumer market has softened globally for the group, Silver says the company’s B2B operations have experienced solid growth, initially through an early take-up by Domino’s for pizza delivery and more recently securing an agreement with Pizza Hut.
While it has generated most of its sales in Australia to date, the company is significantly ramping up its European operations with a new distributor.
“We have just announced our European partner which is going to cover five markets itself, which almost doubles our country network,” says Silver.
“Our importer in Spain has already made a bunch of sales even before they have got their first order.”
The Benzina Zero co-founder says the company is also eying the US, although this market may take some time to develop.
“While we have had early conversations with an importing partner there, we are still in the very early stages and some of that is around the constantly evolving landscape of imports and tariffs,” says Silver.
“So, at the moment our more strategic focus is on Europe.”
Funds from the raise will be used to bring to the market the company's latest prototype, the Duo Max Post-E, which was developed at Benzina Zero's Virginia facility in Brisbane.
“The Duo Max is like our Duo Plus but at the top level of performance and range,” says Silver.
“We have already proved the concept and now we are rolling it out. We do a lot of work with mail contractors so this product will be for those really long runs and really challenging environments to provide more power with performance up to 100km/h and better range.”
The latest capital raise will also be used to supply sample products for clients and drive a new round of strategic hires to expand its reach in Europe.
“Once our funding is through, we will be making these strategic hires and moving forward to the next step,” says Silver.
According to the offer document, Benzina Zero posted revenue of $1.48 million in the first 11 months of FY25, which compares with $1.35 million for the FY24 full year – up 33 per cent on the previous year.
The company says the growth was achieved despite a “challenging retail environment, underscoring the resilience of our strategy and market positioning”.
Gross margins improved over the year due to a decrease in the cost of sales over the current year and a drop in low-margin promotional sales.
While the company is targeting a 20 per cent revenue increase in FY25, the five months to the end of May this year delivered 24.9 per cent growth over the monthly revenue average in 2024.
Last year, Benzina Zero secured a partnership with Nasdaq-listed clean technology innovator Beam Global, which came on the heels of the US company launching its BeamWell water desalination and e-mobility delivery system employing Benzina Zero electric scooters.
Silver says the Beam Global partnership provides a “strong pathway” to significant sales in international markets.
“From a humanitarian perspective where people have no access to drinking water, the BeamWell system is deployed in crisis zones,” says Silver.
“It has a water desalination plant and a water tank and four of our Duo scooters which deliver medicine, aid and water to local areas.
“The first one is currently in Jordan and ready to be deployed to Gaza.”
The company is also collaborating with BeamBike currently in Serbia to deploy an e-bike ride share system, which Benzina Zero expects will lead to a tender request for 3,000 e-bike units.
Silver says Benzina Zero is gaining traction in its global markets through a solutions-led strategy.
“No one just buys our bikes, everyone buys our solution,” he says. “We’ll always work with clients to work out a solution and we are very capable of building out bespoke solutions.”
At the end of its first day, Benzina Zero has raised $1.026 million from 46 investors.
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