Hopium CEO Olivier Lombard interview and the Hopium Machina Vision

Though Olivier Lombard is famous for being one of the youngest winner of Le Mans as well as for his long (and rather virtuoso) career as a racecar driver starting at the ripe age of ten years old, he has now launched himself into a new venture: Hopium. 

Founded in 2019, the company aims to revolutionise the mobility sector by creating hydrogen high-end cars, inspired by Olivier’s seven years of driving hydrogen race cars. Hopium is made up of a team of experts in hydrogen batteries and engineering all striving for innovation, and just revealed yesterday their latest vehicle, the Hopium Machina Vision. 

The Hopium Machina Vision

A year after the unveiling of its first prototype, Hopium has finally revealed the Hopium Machina Vision concept car, offering for the very first time a full look into the inside of the luxury vehicle. Designed by in-house designer Félix Godard, the Hopium Machina is giving us a look into the future of the relationship between Man and Machine, and we love it already. 

In the front of the car, a full-size screen comes down in front of both driver and passenger to give them access to a plethora of information and in-car entertainment. This screen can be transformed either into an integral version or minimised, with the centre haptic console providing a sensorial connection with the interface. 

At the rear, passengers can enjoy the comfort of a full-scale interior and a mind-blowing panorama of the sky. The materials used for the interior were all sourced in Europe with both transparency and traceability, in order to reduce environmental impact, and all embody the level of quality that will allow for the Hopium Machina to be a timeless vehicle. 

While the exterior design of the vehicle is still kept under wraps, we can already see a silhouette that is both athletic and elegant, all with harmonious proportions. Of course, some elements of the Hopium Machina can be found on the new concept car, including the impressive grille, which comes alive to optimise the fuel cell cooling of the car, but also Hopium’s signature light inspired by reflections and ripples on the surface of water. 

The new concept car will be presented in Paris during the 2022 Mondial de l’Auto in mid October. 

Upon the unveiling of the Hopium Machina Vision, ellectric got to ask Hopium CEO Olivier Lombard some questions about his career path, hydrogen and of course the concept car, which made for some incredibly interesting discussion.

How did you get started in racing? Can you tell us a little bit about the transitions that you took during your career?

Usually you don’t start racing randomly, and for me it was a family affair – my dad was a racing driver and that’s why I started when I was ten years old with go-kart. Then I moved to different classes until I got to race cars at 17, and then after two seasons of single seater I decided to go to endurance racing. That’s why I was aiming to race in Le Mans, and the dream came true in 2011 which was my first participation and also first victory there. After that I did Le Mans again the two following years, and in 2012 I integrated a development program for the first hydrogen race car. Now the program is called Mission H24, and the goal is to put this car in Le Mans in 2024 when the hydrogen car class will be open. 

Can you talk a bit about the importance of hydrogen racing? 

In my case for example, I’ve been developing with the first two generations of cars and the last one was 640 horsepower – and what’s cool with racing is that you try to push the technology at its maximum, so you really push the boundaries. In my case it was always going to look for performance, and I think that’s the best environment to develop technologies and understand the limits and potentialities.

So for me it was first about getting to know the technology very well and then second to realise that “OK, we can do this on the racetrack with this technology, so why not putting it in a high-end car” and that’s where the idea came from of starting my own brand, and it had to be a brand with hydrogen technology at the heart of it. 

Why is hydrogen revolutionary for electric cars and mobility?

The big advantage is of course the range – that’s the number one. Then you have of course the time in which you can refill your car, which is three to four minutes with hydrogen. The third would be the fact that you have an energetic potential in the car because of hydrogen that is very crucial for the next generation of cars, because you’re going to have a lot of digital experiences in the car and of course it means consumptions. Today you have so many problems with electric cars – even as soon as you turn on the heater or climate control. I think hydrogen, with this big range, can provide the full experience inside the car, so I think that’s the major difference between electric and EVs and hydrogen – which is the future.  

How is hydrogen being received within the industry so far? 

I think it’s pretty paradoxical so far because there are people who are 100% convinced that electric is going to be the future in mobility, but the vast majority of people – even within the electric industry – who are convinced that there is going to be an “after” and it has to be hydrogen, because you have the wide range of applications and of course the passenger car. I think for me there’s going to be first a cohabitation between the two, and then in the end hydrogen will take over because you’ll have hydrogen planes, cars, trucks… 

Hopium just released its latest hydrogen vehicle, the Hopium Machina, and one thing that stuck out to us was the digital flexibility of the car, with the possibility to have either a fully digitised experience or practically no in-car entertainment at all. Can you tell us more about the reasoning behind this?

We want to give the driver the choice at will of what kind of experience he wants. If you want to be in some kind of explore mode where you want to only enjoy the exterior of the car, then you can reduce the digital to the minimum. If instead you want to enjoy the digital landscape at its maximum then you can have it deployed. For instance, even if you want to enjoy pleasure driving – and that’s where I come from – you don’t want to have a big screen but rather just focus on the road, then it’s also giving you this possibility. 

How is your background as a racecar driver informing your decisions as the CEO of Hopium? 

I think that for sure all the values that I learned in my high-level sportsman career and racing driver are helping me everyday, because it allows me to bring a lot of dynamism, will and rigour to my teams. Regarding the product – you know, when you’re a racer you need to have a very close interaction with your car, you need to feel everything, and you’re looking for performance and simplicity, which is what I try to say to my designer Felix. I’m looking for something that people will have that has to be about performance but simple in its design and again about this interaction – how can we rethink the way you interact with the car and make it more organic? Today you have so much technology arriving in our lives and sometimes it’s not human anymore – so how can a car become more like a companion rather than an object that takes you from point A to point B. 

What is your view on the future of mobility and what are some of the changes that you think need to happen in the industry? 

A lot of people talk about shared mobility and mobility as a service, and when I see the amount of cars on the roads…I mean nothing can only work with shared mobility, and there will always be a need for cars. When I land in L.A and see the traffic, I think that for sure there is a future for passenger vehicles. This is what we’re trying to bring back also – and sometimes in some countries there isn’t this pride anymore about owning a car, and we’re trying to create a car that is a desirable product that you want to own and transmit to younger generations

Pictures: Hopium