What we talked about
Arun Seelam is the co-founder and CEO of Boson Motors, building rugged, affordable electric utility vehicles for agriculture, ranches, and commercial use. In this conversation, Arun shares how his experience as an ex-Google database engineer:watching early autonomy and Android Auto:sparked a different mission: bring practical automation to underserved off-road markets where labor shortages are rising and margins are thin.
Show notes
While Waymo and the autonomous vehicle industry aimed at high-end, on-road markets, Arun Seelam saw a different opportunity: the median age of a US farmer is above 50, young people aren’t replacing them, and nobody was building an affordable electric utility vehicle that a farmer could automate without learning to code. The Boson Motors LX40 is his answer:rated at one ton of payload and priced at $27,999.
What we covered
- The LX40’s automation model is “record and play”: a farmer drives a route once or twice, the vehicle learns it, and then runs it autonomously in repeatable loops:no programming required. A 10-year-old tested it successfully during development.
- The suspension and frame were deliberately over-engineered for abuse: one-inch springs nearly six inches in diameter (the kind typically found in Mercedes G-Wagen or high-end Jeep Wranglers), a fully boxed steel frame with no flex, and coil springs on all four independently suspended wheels:all designed to be repaired in under an hour with basic hand tools.
- Boson chose lithium iron phosphate battery chemistry over the more common NMC (nickel-cobalt-manganese) specifically because LFP handles thermal shocks without risk of thermal runaway:critical for field environments where batteries may be mistreated and there is no sophisticated shop nearby.
- The braking system is derived from Baja race vehicles: a long brake pedal that uses mechanical leverage from the driver’s foot without a vacuum booster, eliminating one more component that can fail and be hard to source.
- An autonomous security patrol variant has been running continuously on a private ranch in South Texas for four months, detecting encroachment and deterring theft:Boson plans a commercial deployment of this variant in July 2026.
- With 35 units deployed in California in their first year, Boson’s 2026 focus is scaling to a few hundred units across California and South Texas, with dealers already appointed in the Central Valley and Southern California, and distribution also active in Australia and New Zealand.
About Arun Seelam
Arun Seelam is the co-founder and CEO of Boson Motors, an electric utility vehicle company building smart, rugged off-road vehicles for agriculture and commercial use. He previously worked as a database engineer at Google and conducted research in AI multi-agent systems.
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aforarun
- Website: https://www.bosonpower.com
Episode 108 of the PreVetted Podcast.