Fisker Ocean EV will be "revolutionary"

Electric vehicle early adopter Henrik Fisker believes he has cracked the code to become a profitable EV manufacturer and a true rival for Elon Musk and Tesla.

And he’s not scared to hype the stripped back business model his EV start-up, Fisker Inc, has adopted to achieve it.

“We are really revolutionising every aspect of the car industry,” Fisker told Automotive News.

“I think the car industry needs to change, I think it is too inefficient today. The consumer is paying too much for things they don’t really care about.”

Fisker, the former BMW and Aston Martin designer who had an electrified sports sedan briefly on-sale before Tesla launched the Model S, bullishly announced plans last week for Fisker Inc to become a publicly listed company in the fourth quarter of 2020.

That’s more than two years before the first Fisker Inc production vehicle, the hits the market in late 2022 priced from a low – for an EV – $US37,499 ($A54,000).

Fisker also recently revealed the Ocean will be based on Volkswagen Group’s new MEB EV architecture, and confirmed production of the Ocean will be outsourced –but isn’t saying to who.

Given that Tesla is now more valuable than Toyota based on stock price – despite never having made an annual profit – and hydrogen start-up Nikola bounded to a $US34 billion value (it’s now $US18.9b) without ever selling a production vehicle, it’s easy to see why Fisker is keen to get in on the IPO action.

California-based Fisker Inc has been valued at $US2.9 billion and will employ what’s called a reverse merger with a shell company called Spartan Energy Acquisition Corp to gain its listing. Nikola employed the same strategy.

The listing on the New York stock exchange is expected to generate $US1.1 billion for the company. If that pans out then Fisker won’t need any more funds before start of Ocean production. He even expects the company to be cash-flow positive in the first full year of Ocean production in 2023.

If he does that he will definitely have topped Musk on that score, as Tesla has long been a financial blackhole.

While Fisker has focussed on the luxury space in the past, the Ocean is a very different player; mass volume, low prices, an affordable $US379 ($A543) per month lease and subscription offers designed to move electrified metal.

Fisker says acquiring the platform, powertrain and other technologies externally from known suppliers, outsourcing manufacturing, selling only via an app rather than bricks and mortar dealerships and contracting a third party to handle servicing and storage are keys to delivering an affordable price for Ocean.

It also allows Fisker Inc to focus its budget on developing the Ocean’s software, design and consumer digital experience.

“That is where we are putting all of our money,” Fisker told CNBC.

Always confident and always optimistic, Fisker is spruiking hard the development and retail model he is proposing for Fisker and the Ocean.

“Yes it is cool to work down the lane on your own factory floor, but this is not about hat,” Fisker told Automotive News. “This is about bringing a high-quality profitable vehicle to market.”

Fisker is nothing if not persistent. Undoubtedly a talented designer, he contributed to the original BMW X5 and oversaw the retro BMW Z8 sports car at the Munich car-maker.

In the design chief’s job at Aston Martin he was responsible for the introduction of the V8 Vantage.

But the 56-year-old Danish-American has motored his way down more than one byway since leaving Aston in 2005.

He contributed to the early design stages of the Tesla Model S, a collaboration which ended in court (he won). He established Fisker Automotive and brought the beautiful but technically troubled Karma plug-in sedan to market, but that ended in bankruptcy.

He says that experience taught him the folly of vertically integrated car companies, hence the minimalist model for Fisker Inc.

“That’s for the old days,” he told Automotive News. “I think we have to look different at how a car company should look in the future.”

Various other projects have included Fisker Coachbuild, HF Design, Henrik Fisker Lifestyle and VLF Automotive, in which Holden fan Bob Lutz is a partner. Aston Martin challenged a couple of Fisker’s designs for VLF in court but that was settled quickly.

Then came Fisker Inc, which was established in 2016. It first showed the Emotion sports sedan concept, but that has been delayed along with the solid-state batteries Fisker was developing to power it – what happened to out-sourcing?

In the CNBC interview, Fisker explained what distinguished the Ocean from its rivals such as the Tesla Model Y.

“It’s not a cross-over hatchback, it’s real good looking mid-size SUV, which is very different from everything you see in the market,” he said.

“Secondly, we have a very unique flexi-lease model where you can actually lease this model and give it back any time, so we have a completely different value proposition.

“Finally, we are aiming at making the world’s most sustainable vehicle and I think young people who today – or in the next two or three years – are coming into the market of electrification, they are going to look at what the company does to make a better world and cleaner world.

“That’s something our brand stands for.”