Henrik Fisker’s electric car company started out as a competitor to the pioneer Tesla. But delays and sales problems led to bankruptcy.
Tesla challenger Fisker is seeking protection from its creditors in bankruptcy proceedings. The move has been announced for weeks. Henrik Fisker warned at the end of February that without fresh money, the company’s existence would be at risk.
Since then, talks with a “major car manufacturer” about an investment have been fruitless. Increased financing and the sale of vehicles already built at discounts were not enough without a deal with the manufacturer. On Monday, Fisker filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 of the US bankruptcy law in the state of Delaware.
Henrik Fisker suspended production in mid-March to save money
Fisker’s Ocean SUV model came onto the market later than planned, partly due to problems with suppliers. Some of the first customers and trade journalists also criticized software errors and technical problems. Last year, Fisker built almost 10,200 Ocean vehicles and delivered 4,929 of them to customers.
Fisker declared that the original direct sales model in the USA and Europe had largely failed and had been trying to get out of the situation with a dealer model since January. This year, Fisker wanted to hand over 20,000 to 22,000 cars to customers and dealers. But production was suspended in mid-March to save money.
Fisker entered the market as a challenger to electric car pioneer Tesla. However, sales of electric cars have not grown nearly as quickly as expected a few years ago. Other Tesla competitors such as Rivian and Lucid are also notoriously in the red – but thanks in part to wealthy investors, they have deeper pockets, while Fisker is running out of money.
For company boss Henrik Fisker, this is the second bankruptcy of a car company he founded after 2013. He had previously worked as a car designer at BMW and Aston Martin, among others.
Source: Stern
