A Norwegian electric car is coming to the United States through Menlo Park.

"We're going to tap into the next Prius wave," said Ray Lane, a partner at the Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers venture capital firm and chairman of Think North America, which was announced Monday.

The Think City, a four-seat electric car about the size of a Honda Fit or Mini Cooper, will arrive in the United States in limited numbers later this year, Lane said. Utilities such as Pacific Gas & Electric and "influential companies" such as Google will get the first ones, for testing and evaluation purposes, Lane said. (A Swedish utility just ordered 1,000 Thinks, said Jan-Olaf Willums, chief executive of Think Global.)

In 2009, the cars will go on sale to the public in the United States, although the company hasn't decided on its distribution model. At $25,000, Lane said, Think could be selling as many as 50,000 units in two or three years.

Kleiner and RockPort Capital Partners formed a joint venture with Think Global to form Think North America. The company said it has hired Vicki Northrup, an electric-auto industry veteran, as its operations manager to head its Menlo Park office.

The vehicle has a 65-mph top speed and can go 110 miles on one charge. The company describes the car as emissions-free, 95 percent recyclable and says it meets all U.S. and European safety standards.


Lane said the new company will help Think develop future vehicles for the United States, which he described as "a very different marketplace" than Europe. It might even manufacture future Think vehicles in the United States, he said.