Henrik Fisker: Shamelessness Personified
From Green Car Reports: Fisker’s new mainstream Ocean SUV may still be more than a year away, by optimistic time frames, but the company’s marketing machine has been hard at work. Fisker Inc. announced its flexible lease program Wednesday, and even told us how much it will cost. “People around the globe will be able to obtain the Fisker Ocean starting at $379 (U.S.) per month via our mobile app in 2022,” CEO Henrik Fisker said in Wednesday’s announcement. That’s lower than the lowest ($399) monthly lease payment we’ve seen so far on the Tesla Model 3.
Before I could write something sarcastic about this, I noticed that my colleague, EV journalist Forbes Black had beaten me to the punch: How much for the “Smoke and Mirrors” model? I hear it is the fastest!
Now that’s funny. For those who haven’t been following the Fisker story, it goes like this: delays, broken promises, setbacks, lies, holdups, obfuscations, detainments, bullcrap, postponements, untruths, deferrals, reschedulings, disappointments and continuations.
I saw a prototype of the Fisker Karma at the Los Angles Auto Show in 2008, promised for 2010. In 2009 I saw a newer prototype, but this one had a decorative rope around it so no one could get anywhere near it; someone told me that they were afraid the driver’s door was going to fall off. In 2013 Fisker Automotive went bankrupt due to the fact that the Karma never really came to production. In 2016, just three years later, Fisker was back with more vaporware.
The man has no shame. An important characteristic for success in today’s world.
Craig,
WTF? Where do you get off defaming people who have struggled against great odds to accomplish more than you ever will?
Why do you do this? What motivates you to completely misrepresent people you’ve never met and know nothing about?
Why all the nastiness and viscous lies?
What’s happened to you since 2016?
Fisker Automotive produced and sold, more than 2500 units of the Karma model. (certainly not vaporware ! ).
Henrik Fisker reamins a highly respected automotive designer and engineer with a long history of success in the Automotive industry.
Among Henrick Fisker’s achievements are the
BMW Z8
Aston Martin DB9
Aston Martin V8 Vantage
Fisker Karma
Galpin-Fisker Mustang Rocket,
VLF Force 1 V10,
VLF Destino V8
Fisker EMotion
Fisker Ocean
Fisker Orbit
Viking motorcycle
Benetti-Fisker 50 superyacht
In contrast, tell us exactly what are your achievements in automotive design ?
The Fisker Karma won numerous awards including;
International Design Awards Product Design of the Year. Silver Edison Award
Automobile magazine’s Design of the Year Award.
Top Gear Car of the Year,
Fast Company’s Innovation By Design Award
Time magazine’s No 2 Best Invention of 2011
European Motor Writers Award for 2011.
How many awards have you won?
Okay, let see, how many Fisker Karma are still in existence? 2280, 90% ! That’s remarkable, especially as the model still fetches $35,000 for a poor example, and up to $85,000 for a low mileage car in excellent condition.
Green fanatics have never forgiven Fisker for winning the law suit brought against him by Elon Musk and Tesla.
Fisker Automotive was plagued with bad luck.(ironic for a car named Karma).
Partly the problem was the complication of producing a hybrid.
Unless a company has the resources of a major OEM hybrid engineering is extremely expensive and complicated, especially in a fairly restricted design.
Fisker outsourced most of the more complex engineering to save on capital cost, thereby losing direct quality control and scheduling. The company was completely under-resourced as is the case with all small manufacturers.
Fisker had extraordinary run of sheer bad luck. Unlike Tesla which chose to partner with NEC the leading Japanese battery manufacturer, Fisker was forced by the DoE to rely on the American A123 battery maker which went spectacularly bankrupt.
A123 had made many promises to Fisker, but failed to live up to it’s claims leaving Fisker to re-engineer solutions for flawed technology it had already paid 123.
In addition, Fisker suffered a huge hit (and probably mortal blow) when Hurricane Sandy destroyed a shipment of 338 Karmas at Port Newark, New Jersey.
The bad publicity and initial default by the insurer, destroyed Fisker’s already tottering finances.
Fisker wasn’t helped by the Department of Energy freezing Fisker’s credit line in August 2012 after US$192 million had been drawn.
Fisker claimed the DOE froze the loan because in an election year the Obama administration didn’t want to be seen supporting the manufacture of luxury vehicles too expensive for much of the general public to afford.
Although the DOE had other and perfectly valid reasons for concern, the DoE admitted in court the administration’s political interference was a significant factor.
Fisker had relied upon the balance of the DOE funding to move into their new factory and bring much of the outsourced manufacture in house. At the DoE request, Fisker had spent a lot of time and effort trying to disign a cheaper compact version of the Karma.(Q car).
The Fisker Karma was a brave effort at building a high quality, environmentally conscious luxury sports sedan.
More than 2500 were produced and the majority of those cars are still owned by thousands of loyal, Fisker enthusiasts
That’s hardly ‘vapourware’!
The Fisker Karma wasn’t perfect, it was probably over-ambitious, but it didn’t deserve all the acrimony it attracted.
You do yourself no credit in lying about a great visionary like Henrik Fisker.
I’m quite positive Henrik Fisker is capable of designing a successful and advanced EV. I’ve been privileged to see the proposed vehicles and examine in detail and I can attest to the practicability of the design.
For the Fisker e-motion or Ocean model to find commercial success, everything will depend on the ESD or battery technology.
Fisker claims it’s close to commercializing it’s patented flexible solid-state battery technology.
Such a battery would give Fisker vehicles 3-400 mile range, but only require 1-3 minute charging time.
Testing by LG CHem confirms the batteries should durable and relatively cheap once in mass production.
Dr Fabio Albano is Fisker’s chief scientist. Dr Albino is highly regarded in solid-state battery research, and probably the reason why a heavyweight investor like Caterpillar Venture Capital has decided to back Fisker’s new venture.
IMO, the key to Fisker’s dream becoming a reality is the ESD he is striving to perfect. If it works, Fisker will become a major player, not just in EV technology but he will revolutionize the Automotive Industry.
What nobody needs is sniggering little critics, spitefully venting jealous gossip and lies.
Do some research, even just a little, before you disparage people and projects.