• by Tanya Gazdik , April 27, 2024

Fisker, a California-based electric vehicle company founded by Henrik Fisker that hoped to compete with Tesla, is facing bankruptcy.

The automaker revealed its crisis in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last week.

“Once valued at $2.9 billion, Fisker’s coffers have dwindled to the point where the company failed to make an $8.4 million interest payment in March,” according to SFGate. “Without fresh capital or relief from debt holders, the carmaker expects it will need to file for bankruptcy within 30 days, the filing revealed.”

Reviews for the Fisker Ocean have not been kind. 

Marques Brownlee, a reviewer with a big following on YouTube, titled his February Ocean review video with: “This is the Worst Car I’ve Ever Reviewed.”

Founder Henrik Fisker reportedly told employees that the company is in talks to be acquired by another automaker.

"Fisker didn’t name the automakers that are interested, but he did tell the staff, ‘We still have some time to get other offers on Fisker. We do have four car companies that have signed NDAs. However, they obviously need time to get to some diligence,’” according to Jalopnik. 

Meanwhile, Tesla founder Elon Musks told investors the EV maker is working on an “affordable” vehicle for the masses. 

“Musk did not specify whether those models actually would hit the $25,000 price point he had discussed during earlier conference calls,” according to WardsAuto. 

Musk's new strategy followed an exclusive Reuters report that Tesla had shelved plans to release a long-awaited, new model expected to cost $25,000 in late 2025.

"Investors had expected the affordable car, often called the Model 2, to drive the company's growth into a mass-market automaker,” according to Reuters. “Instead, Tesla said this week, it will use a current platform and production lines to produce what it called 'more affordable' models by early next year. It did not provide details or pricing.”

Musk says the new BEVs should be ready to roll off Tesla’s existing assembly lines late this year or in early 2025. Additionally, Tesla will be introducing a robo-taxi in August, Musk says.

“We’re super excited about our autonomy road map,” Musk said during the call according to WardsAuto. “We’re really headed for an electric and autonomous future.”

Driving a gas-powered vehicle without autonomy will soon become the equivalent of “riding a horse and using a flip phone,” Musk says.

In the future, using an autonomous vehicle will become as common as using an elevator: “You’ll just call one on your phone, use it and leave. You won’t even think about it,” Musk says.