Fisker Plans More Layoffs and Bankruptcy Looms | Hacker News Reader

Fisker Plans More Layoffs and Bankruptcy Looms

techcrunch.com

16 pointssarimkx5 comments

I guess the timing was way off given the end of ZIRP and all, but it's a shame that even this EV company model failed.

They stood out by using an established contract manufacturer for production (Magna). I'm sure that eats into margins a lot but it also meant they didn't have "production hell" and the same multi-billion investment to build out a factor that other EV startups have gone through.

Not sure how much is timing and how much is Fisker given his track record.

Also crazy they botched the software & customer service given they outsourced the actual building cars part... and still had mechanical defects (design or build issue ?).

Outsourcing production sounds great conceptually; "It's great! Production issues are someone elses problem now!" Until you realize that producing EVs is hard and when there are problems you now have many layers of management between your customer services and the people who can actually fix the problem.

People bitch and complain about Tesla all the time, but their vertical integration means that they can fix problems with their cars relatively quickly.

I think this is why Fisker failed. Twice.

Yeah this is a completely fair point. I've seen this in software so its not shocking.

IIRC the contract manufacturer, Steyr Magna, historically produced mainly small-run, expensive cars, trucks and military APCs (!).

I suspect that Fisker was spending a lot more per delivered vehicle than their direct competitors like Tesla, Audi, BMW, Polestar. Maybe breaking even on the car itself but having their operating costs (sales) digging a progressively bigger hole each month.

'We lose money on every sale but we make it up in volume!'

Magna is a massive supplier. Those small run cars are not their primary product, from my understanding. The components for vehicles are their primary product.

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