100 electric water taxis could soon change the way you travel around the Maldives archipelago

The Maldives is 26 atolls and more than a thousand islands scattered across 35,000 square miles of the Indian Ocean, with no roads, no bridges, and no way of getting anywhere except by water or air, a geographical fact that has shaped the experience of travelling there ever since tourism first arrived. For most visitors, that second journey begins at Velana International Airport and ends on the back of a diesel speedboat, loud, rough, and smelling faintly of fuel, with the resort still somewhere over the horizon. That experience may be about to change.

A fleet of 100 electric foiling vessels is set to be deployed across the Maldives over the next three years, ferrying tourists and residents between airports, resorts, and local islands. The boats in question glide above the water on carbon hydrofoils, lifting the hull clear of the surface and eliminating the bumpiness that has long defined inter-island travel here. Five are scheduled for delivery this year, with the rest of the fleet following in stages.

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The woman from Kolkata who built a flying boat

The vessel was conceived by Sampriti Bhattacharyya, who grew up in Kolkata, studied engineering at West Bengal University of Technology, and applied to 540 internships before a single one wrote back. That one was Fermilab, the particle physics laboratory outside Chicago, where she arrived at twenty years old with $200 in her pocket, boarding a plane for the first time.

She went on to complete a master's degree at Ohio State University and a doctorate in mechanical engineering at MIT, with stints working on flight control at NASA along the way. In 2020, she turned her attention from aerospace to the ocean, and began building what is now considered America's first all-electric hydrofoiling boat.

That a vessel designed by a woman from Bengal, who once failed physics at school and was advised, by at least one teacher, to become a housewife — may soon become a routine way of getting from the airport to a Maldives resort is worth admiring.

What the experience will actually be like

At speed, the hull lifts roughly four feet above the surface. A flight control system reads wave conditions continuously, adjusting the foils up to fifty times per second to smooth out the motion without the driver having to think about it at all.

It will almost be like being on a very low aircraft. Two electric motors power the vessel to a top speed of 35 knots, with a range of 75 nautical miles at cruising pace, and it will run on battery power, which means no exhaust fumes, no diesel rumble, and none of the spray that tends to arrive uninvited on conventional speedboats. There are three operating modes to suit conditions or passenger preference, and auto-docking ensures the experience is smooth at both ends, not just in transit.

A first for electric maritime travel at scale

Foiling water taxis could move people across these waterways with dramatically less noise, no environmental cost, and considerably more comfort than anything currently on offer. Whether it all works as promised, in real ocean conditions and at genuine scale, remains to be seen.