Extreme E, the pioneering electric off-road racing championship, partnered with XITE ENERGY, who became its Official Drink Supplier, in Season 1. XITE ENERGY, which was founded in Bristol, UK, and is still only a few years old, has already made huge waves in the highly competitive energy drinks market. It is the brainchild of Extreme E driver Oli Bennett and its co-founder Megan Jones.
XITE ENERGY Racing are also competing once again in Extreme E for Season 2 and achieved their best result to date last time out, with a maiden podium in the first round of the NEOM Island X Prix double-header in Sardinia courtesy of their new driver pairing in Timo Scheider and Tamara Molinaro.
Bennett has provided an insight into how XITE was created and the brand’s sustainability initiatives.
Extreme E: Could you explain what XITE is and how the journey started?
Oli Bennett: XITE is a nootropic energy brand which started with both mine and Megan’s passion to fuel our fast-paced lifestyles. From rallycross racing, to hitting the gym to completing a sports nutrition degree, we found an entrepreneurial spark when travelling across America during my racing career in rallycross. Navigating a race track at high speed, I recognised the importance of keeping my mind alert and reactions rapid. While embarking on a mission researching what goes in their body and helps their bodies, we realised at the heart of this is healthy nutrition. This is where the journey started as we discovered nootropics and their copious benefits on brain function.
XE: What made you want to go into energy drinks?
OB: It’s not unheard of that energy drinks and extreme sports go hand in hand. I’ve been surrounded by many other energy drink brands throughout my rallycross racing life. With sponsorships floating around each team, I thought why not create my own – but do it even better!
Energy drinks are the ideal drink for racing as they give you a hit of caffeine when you need it most. Unlike most energy drinks, we saw a need for a ‘better for you’ version, with natural ingredients combined with nootropics for the ultimate focus enhancing beverage! XITE can be drank anytime and for me it suits me when I’m up early in the morning, about to hit the track and need to be super awake.
XE: How does XITE differ from its competitors? What makes both the brand and products exciting for new consumers?
OB: XITE’s main USP is that we have added nootropics. We’re the ‘better for you’ energy drink, created to be healthy, not boring. We have all the energy you need without the chemicals you don’t. Our fun, vibrant branding reflects the type of people we aim to attract and the energy we want to exude. We want to put some ‘xitement’ into people’s day, so they look forward to the drink or snack that is going to keep them focused on what’s important to them.
XE: What is it about XITE that attracts health-conscious individuals?
OB: We work with a lot of health-conscious influencers and brand ambassadors. A healthy lifestyle is very important to us. The people that promote our products need to reflect these healthy brand values and fit the target demographic of active, ambitious and healthy!
Other than ambassadors, we pride ourselves on amazing ingredients that actually work. Low sugar is important to us – as it is to a lot of people! We’re no stranger to reading the back of labels to see the nutritional contents of what we’re consuming. When developing products, we were very selective with ingredients, researching every element in the drinks and bars to ensure it was high quality and healthy. Also, ensuring the sweeteners and other added ‘nasties’ which other energy drink brands use was carefully studied.
The product is designed to resonate with fellow Gen Z’ers by using nootropics, natural caffeine (green coffee bean), natural flavours, pansax ginseng, L-tyrosine and L-carnitine – all designed to keep energy levels constant without the ‘highs and lows’ associated with most other energy drinks.
XE: What made you want to utilise Nootropics?
OB: For those who are not aware of what nootropics are, they are an amino acid ingredient that claims to boost brain performance and improve cognitive function, in particular: attention, memory, focus – even sometimes creativity and motivation. From navigating the supplement industry to looking at ingredients to help me focus on track, nootropic foods and supplements are the perfect brain boosting ingredients to get you ahead of the rest. That’s why we include nootropics in all of XITE’s products.
XE: How have XITE and Extreme E partnered together?
OB: Extreme E is the innovation in off road racing, showcasing the world’s leading EV tech. This goes hand in hand with XITE and disrupting the status quo.
XE: How did XITE get involved with motorsport and why was electric motorsport like Extreme E chosen as a way to showcase the brand?
OB: The high focus demands from motorsport, especially EV motorsport and its innovation, go hand in hand with our brands ethos and consumers! The synergy between XITE and Extreme E is incredible. XITE Energy provides sustained energy thanks to the use of natural caffeine and nootropics, while my Extreme E ODYSSEY 21’s battery is filled with electricity sourced by the combination of hydrogen and oxygen.
XE: How does XITE share a similar ethos to Extreme E?
OB: Innovation, inclusivity and remarkability are core to both XITE and Extreme E as we lead the path into future innovations, one better for the planet and one better for the body and mind!
XE: With Extreme E, XITE collaborated on a legacy programme in Greenland. Could you please tell us a little more about the programme and how it benefitted the community there?
OB: We deployed a revolutionary solar array set-up to a local school, providing them clean and efficient energy to reduce their dependence on fossil fuel generation. This replaced the school’s diesel generator which fell silent for the last time in August. The following day, they made switch the school to solar.
With current global climate issues, nowhere is more obvious than Greenland’s melting glaciers. We identified Greenland as somewhere we – along with our partners myenergi – could make a difference to people’s lives. We need to educate the next generation and what better way to do that than show them how a school can be powered from a sustainable source. XITE ENERGY and myenergi installed a 5kW ground-mounted solar array with an accompanying 5.2kWh battery storage system. The myenergi eddi power diverter will utilise excess solar energy to heat the school’s water which is all controlled through the myenergi home control app. Crucially, this app will also allow the school children to watch energy levels rising as the sun comes up.
Thanks to our partner’s innovative renewable technologies, this project will enable the school to operate completely off-grid – zero carbon, zero reliance on mains supply, zero utility costs. It demonstrates precisely why embracing sustainability is such an important part of the global energy transition.
XE: Since Greenland, what have XITE been up to in both racing and sustainability?
OB: We have since launched another XITE ENEGY RACING team in the Nitro electric series, further committing our brand to EV off road racing and the likeness that gives to our own brand innovations alongside Jenson Button joining as a team mate! With this, we have invested in two more electric EV race cars to further develop our EV motorsport commitments.
Sustainability wise, we have also from the brand side donated £1k last month to mental health charities. Additionally, our parent firm, Bee Green Energy, has also invested in battery storage infrastructure across the U.K which is the company that deployed the solar installation in Greenland on behalf of XITE ENERGY.
XE: Are there other community outreach programmes that XITE is involved in?
OB: For every can sold, 1p goes to mental health charities which showcases our belief in brain health being paramount to everyone and anyone.
XE: What it is in the pipeline for XITE, the brand’s future plans and any future products we can expect soon?
OB: We are launching two new products again with Nootropics for different US events alongside launching a new flavour in the coming months! Not only that, we also be launching the brand into the USA in four months which is super XITE’ing!
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