Skip to main content

Meet Motivo, the mercenary engineers quietly crafting the tech in your next car

There’s a lot about new technology that people take for granted. When we get into our cars, we rarely stop to think about who invented the USB port (Ajay Bhatt) or Bluetooth (Dr. Jaap Haartsen); we just use them. And we really don’t often wonder about the development processes for the tech that we use every day.

We tend to think of new technology as happy accidents, like someone just woke up knowing how to make adaptive cruise control one morning, but that’s not how it happens at all. Thomas Edison famously tried thousands of times before perfecting the light bulb, and it’s not any easier today.

So how does invention happen in an era of explosive change in technology? Is it still a mad scientist working alone in his basement? Not quite, as it turns out. We went to Gardena, California, recently to see where the next generation of technology is being invented at Motivo Engineering. Motivo provides engineering and rapid prototyping services to the automotive, medical and general technology industries.

“We are the problem solvers,” says Motivo CEO Praveen Penmetsa. “Our clients may already have something that’s not working or they have an idea that needs to be converted into something that actually works.”

Hands-on development

There are a lot of design firms in the world who can design a product, and there are engineering firms out there who can take a design and figure out how to make it, but where Motivo and other firms differ is that Motivo is a hands-on development environment. Edison would recognize their work style, and approve.

Motivo CEO Praveen Penmetsa in a warehouse
Motivo CEO Praveen Penmetsa. Photo: Jeff Zurschmeide/Digital Trends
Praveen Penmetsa is the CEO and driving force behind Motivo. Photo: Jeff Zurschmeide/Digital Trends

“What makes us different is that we take on the complex challenges,” Praveen says. “We can take on a thousand-volt system that puts out hundreds of kilowatts of power. Not only can we build it right, we can build it safely and build something that will last for years.”

Praveen couldn’t comment on the record about the driverless 18-wheeler or the autonomous taxi cab we saw under development at his facility, and we couldn’t take pictures of them, but that’s the kind of tech they’re working on today.

“Our lead engineer has a Ph.D. that came out of the Carnegie Mellon robotics lab in the early 2000s,” Praveen says. “We met him when we were working on the DARPA Grand Challenge robot project back in 2003. So we were doing robots and autonomous things before it was really fashionable. It’s only now that we’re starting to see a lot of our work be recognized and show up in commercial things like trucks and planes and cars.”

Motivo’s publicly acknowledged client base includes names like Faraday Future, Nissan, BMW, Eaton, and Panasonic. Privately, they’re working with others in the automotive and electronics industries as well.

A collaborative work process

Corporations come to Motivo because this company works quickly and collaboratively. There are no office walls between designers, engineers, executives or fabricators at Motivo. Everyone works in a large, open area with huge white boards for every project.

We tend to think of new technology as happy accidents, but that’s not how it happens at all.

“It goes back to a race car mentality,” Praveen explains, “where the race engineer, the fabricator, the wheelman, everybody, including the driver, all have to work quickly for the whole package to come together. Our projects are very short in timeline and very risky. Most of our projects are less than three months from the contract getting signed to something rolling out of the door under its own power. That’s the reason we have to work together as team. There’s no stratification here.”

The concept is tailored to fast turnaround and problem solving. If an electrical or mechanical engineer is needed, there’s one just few yards away and no organizational or physical barriers between employees.

“One thing that you’ll see is a lot of our electrical engineers explaining to mechanical guys how their system works, and vice versa,” Praveen says. “It is important for both of them to know that. For example, we work on very complex gearboxes. If the electronics controls person doesn’t know how these gears actually mesh and shift and when and how and how it’s going to get used, there’s no way they can write good software.”

Behind the curtain

You’ve probably never heard of Motivo before. One reason for that is they often can’t claim credit for what they’ve done. You will see Motivo’s work with their client’s name on the final product.

“Our clients either call us or send an e-mail,” Praveen says. “A lot of people just recommend us from word of mouth, right. So they find us and say, ‘Hey so and so said you’re the right team to do this,’ and we start with a small conversation.”

A Motivo Engineering concept car is displayed
This Neighborhood Electric Vehicle (NEV) was designed to be lightweight, use renewable materials, and showcase Motivo’s skills. The entire vehicle was developed at Motivo. Jeff Zurschmeide/Digital Trends

As you might expect, hiring a firm of 20-30 engineers and designers to invent or make a rapid prototype of new technology doesn’t come cheap. But as Praveen notes, it’s cheaper than hiring an army of engineers to do it yourself.

“We had a client who wanted us to create a high-speed electric boat,” Praveen recalls. “There was another startup company at the same time trying to do very much the same thing, and they spent in excess of $5 million and never got a robust, reliable boat running because it’s a big problem. But for less than a million dollars and within nine months we gave him a product that worked and is still working after four years. It’s a prototype that he can use as a blueprint. We gave him exactly what he wanted and that really is our value.”

Success out of failure

Of course, not everything can be invented on demand. There have been some failures, but like old-time inventors there’s always something to learn for next time.

“If it’s a big complex problem, there’s no guarantee that somebody can solve it,” Praveen admits.

“But we provide a guarantee and a schedule and a deadline. There are problems that we have failed to solve, and that’s okay. We have taken on some crazy projects that have gotten us into trouble – we spent a lot more of our own time and money than what the client paid us! But our clients have appreciated how hard we pushed, and there was always something of value at the end.”

For Praveen and his team, invention and development is often its own reward, and they wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I often tell people that at the end of the day it’s not about the crazy challenges that we take on, it’s about how far we can help our clients move forward,” he says. If we can get something done for them that allows the product to hit the market and make a difference, that’s what we look for.”

Jeff Zurschmeide
Jeff Zurschmeide is a freelance writer from Portland, Oregon. Jeff covers new cars, motor sports, and technical topics for a…
I tried an e-bike for the first time and now I’m hooked
It’s not about being a 'bike person', it’s about finding small upgrades to everyday life
A woman sitting on the Aventon Pace 4

Before this year, I’d never even touched an e-bike before, and the thought of riding one was never on my radar. With life already in constant motion thanks to two toddlers, biking wasn’t something I ever considered adding to the mix.

I’d always assumed e-bikes were for hardcore commuters or serious cyclists, not someone like me. I wasn’t looking for a big lifestyle change. I just wanted a quicker way to get to the park so we’d have more time to play before dinner.

Read more
This week in EV tech: Audi exemplifies auto industry’s EV holding pattern
Close-up of 2025 Audi SQ5 grille, headlight, and badge.

The road to the future runs through the present, and it’s not a straight line. This week, we’re focusing on how Audi is negotiating the twists and turns on the way to an electrified future. EVs are here to stay at Audi, but a gasoline crossover SUV is still the automaker’s bestselling model, and it’s not ready to risk those sales just yet. That’s why the 2025 Audi Q5 received a top-to-bottom overhaul for this model year, bringing its tech features and styling up to date without altering the what has proven to be a very popular package. By maintaining parallel lineups of electric and internal-combustion cars, Audi hopes to give customers more choices. But that doesn’t completely level the playing field. The new Q5 may have yesterday’s powertrain, but Audi isn’t holding back on tech. It features the same electrical architecture, operating system, and three-screen dashboard display as the latest Audi EVs, like the Q6 e-tron. So aside from a little engine noise, there’s little difference in what you can see and interact with from the driver’s seat. It’s not just the infotainment systems. The Q5 and Q6 e-tron are close in size, with similar space for passengers across their two rows of seats. The Q6 e-tron has a bit more cargo space, but not as much as you’d think given the lack of a bulky engine, transmission, and driveshafts. The two SUVs also have similar styling but, having now driven both, we can say that the Q5 is the more pleasant of the two.

More than a difference of powertrain tech

Read more
Take a peek inside the factory making tomorrow’s ride
A Zoox robotaxi.

Amazon-owned Zoox has opened its first facility producing fully autonomous robotaxis. 

A video (above) released by the California-based company offers a peek inside the factory, which, when it reaches full capacity, could roll out as many as 10,000 autonomous vehicles per year.

Read more