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Fisker files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware

Reuters reports that Fisker filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday, pointing Henrik Fisker's second independent automotive act into what looks like the same dramatic close as his first act. The Chapter 11 filing, as opposed to Chapter 13, suggests company efforts to stay in business by shedding assets and working out deals with creditors. On the former front, the paperwork filed in Delaware lists estimated asset value at between $500 million to $1 billion against estimated liabilities of between $100 million and $500 million. On the latter front, Adobe, Google, and SAP are listed as among the 20 largest creditors. A company spokesperson said, "Like other companies in the electric vehicle industry, we have faced various market and macroeconomic headwinds that have impacted our ability to operate efficiently." While that is indisputably true, Fisker's much larger problem was launching a woefully unfinished Ocean SUV, full of novelties and beautiful outside, almost entirely undercooked inside. Fisker is not the only EV maker to have done this, nor is Fisker the only EV maker to come apart after having done so. CEO Henrik Fisker blamed software issues, the same bane that's tripped up multi-billion-dollar blue chips like Volkswagen and Volvo and General Motors in the EV space, and continues to do so. Fisker, though, unlike those other companies, had no stable of traditional moneymaking products to keep the company out of the Valley of the Shadow of Death.     It's not clear if Fisker has a way out of that valley, either; prospects from the outside look dim. Fixing the Ocean, addressing the NHTSA investigations, and restarting production would require enormous sums of money, and it's not clear Fisker has the expertise and will to do those things even if it got the money. Rebuilding the incinerated goodwill of the past few months among buyers and interested shoppers — the nadir being trying to sell Oceans to Fisker employees for $20,000 plus taxes and fees — would cost even more in time and funds. At the time of writing, CarFax lists 173 Fisker Oceans for sale nationwide, all low miles, prices ranging from $26,000 to $46,000.

Fisker adds dealerships to direct sales model to boost EV sales

Electric vehicle company Fisker said on Thursday that it would add dealerships alongside its direct-to-customer distribution model to expand its sales and delivery network. The California-based company, which sells its vehicles across the United States and Canada apart from other markets in Europe, has only two showrooms or Fisker Lounges in North America — one in Los Angeles and the other in New York. In other locations, it has retail stores called Fisker Center+. Fisker said, in Europe, it will continue to offer direct sales but will bring onboard partners for sales and distribution. While the EV startup made more than 10,000 vehicles in 2023, it delivered only about 4,700 units of the Ocean sport utility vehicles due to distribution constraints. "We are evolving our business model and intend to add as many as 50 dealer partners in the US and Canada and a similar number of dealer locations in Europe this year," CEO Henrik Fisker said. The company expects to send its first Ocean vehicles to new dealers by the end of the first quarter, Fisker said, adding that it has been in talks with dealer partners since November 2023. Lucid, Rivian and Fisker have followed an online and direct-to-consumer model that was started by Elon Musk-led Tesla, in their efforts to cut out middlemen that dealership models have. Earlier this week, Vietnamese electric car maker VinFast Auto said that it had signed its first five dealerships in Texas, New York, Kansas and North Carolina. Swedish EV maker Polestar also uses a dealership model. 

Recharge Wrap-up: VW CEO mulls battery factory, voters approve $201B in transportation funding

Volkswagen Group CEO Matthias Muller says that it would "make sense" for the automaker to begin producing its own batteries. As the company moves toward electrification, Muller says it would be a smart move to build a battery factory. "If more than a quarter of our cars are to be electronic vehicles in the foreseeable future then we are going to need approximately 3 million batteries a year," he says. Volkswagen has agreed to cut 30,000 jobs in its restructuring, while committing to creating 9,000 jobs in Germany through battery manufacturing and mobility services. Read more at Automotive News Europe. Election results show a desire for transportation funding. Earlier this month, voters in 22 states approved ballot measures adding up to $201 billion in funding for transportation projects, according to the American Road & Transportation Builders Association. California passed 15 transportation measures, including one in Los Angeles worth $120 billion for roads, bridges, and transit. The state of Washington secured $54 billion for light rail and buses. Atlanta approved about $4 billion for road and transit projects. Illinois and New Jersey passed measures to prevent the diversion of transportation user fee revenue to other industries. Read more from ITS International. The US Department of Energy (DOE) must hand over confidential documents about Fisker's bankruptcy. A Delaware federal judge ordered the DOE to give the documents – which concern a presentation by Fisker to the DOE in which it falsely claimed to meet milestones set forth in a government loan – to lawyers in a case in which investors claim Fisker lied to them about financial troubles. While the DOE has given over documents already, they were incomplete and heavily redacted. "I understand that such disclosures may have a negative impact on future DOE analyses," says US District Judge Sue Robinson. "but conclude nonetheless that under the circumstances at bar – the public money at stake, the Congressional hearings, and the fact that Fisker Automotive is now a defunct company – the balance of interests favors plaintiffs." Read more at Law360. Related Gallery Volkswagen I.D.