The Sanrivatti Hypercar Will Seat its Driver Like a Motorbike

Last month, we heard about a new startup hypercar maker from the Netherlands called Sanrivatti, and were told that its car would be first and foremost designed around the human body. Until now, we’ve not known a whole lot else about what that would mean, but now we do, and it’s not quite what anyone was expecting.

At the core of the still-unnamed hypercar will be what Sanrivatti calls the ‘Apex Position’, which essentially means seating the driver head-first as if they’re riding a superbike. Quite how this is going to work in terms of controls or seating, or whether it’ll allow for passengers, isn’t yet clear, but Sanrivatti’s design sketch gives us an idea of how it might look.

Sanrivatti founder and CEO Santiago Sánchez Rivero explains why the company’s going down this unconventional route: “On a high-performance motorcycle, rider and machine move as one. The connection is immediate, physical and instinctive. Every movement of the body directly influences the experience; every change in balance, posture and perception becomes part of the interaction.

 “By contrast, even the world’s most capable performance cars frequently separate driver and machine through layers of architecture, packaging, systems technologies and convention.”

We’re told that the position ‘combines immersive ergonomics, enhanced body alignment, an extended field of vision and controls designed around natural human movement,’ and that the company is also working on technologies that will allow the driver to move around with the car. All in all, it really sounds like Sanrivatti is trying to build the closest thing yet to a four-wheeled superbike.

Sanrivatti has also detailed more of the team working on the car. They include executive director of technology partnerships Paul Arkesden, who’s previously worked as vice president of engineering at Singer Vehicle Design and led the development of the McLaren P1. Quite the CV, then.

We’re still no closer to knowing what powers the car (although we’re expecting a big petrol engine), what it’ll look like or what it’ll be called, or indeed when we might find any of this out, but we know Sanrivatti is already working on prototypes. More as we have it.