faraday future
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Less than a month after rebranding as Canoo, the startup electric vehicle company formerly known as Evelozcity is on the hunt for $200 million in new capital.
The startup, which is backed by a clutch of private individuals and family offices hailing from China, Germany and Taiwan, is hoping to line up the new capital from some more recognizable names as it finalizes supply deals with vendors, according to a person with knowledge of the company’s plans.
Canoo is locking in final contracts with its vendors and is going to be in production with prototypes before the end of the year. The company, which will make its vehicles available through a subscription-based model, already has 400 employees and just announced new key hires along with its rebranding.
It’s a quick ramp for a company that only two years ago was struggling to extricate itself from the morass that was Faraday Future.
Canoo began life as Evelozcity back in 2017. It was formed after Stefan Krause, a former executive at BMW and Deutsche Bank, and another former BMW executive, Ulrich Kranz, absconded from Faraday Future amid that company’s struggles.
Reportedly, Krause and Kranz left over repeated clashes with Faraday’s founding team of Jia Yueting, the main investor and shareholder, and Chaoying Deng, according to the Verge.
The situation at Evelozcity became so toxic that after the two men left, Jia accused them of “malfeasance and dereliction of duty.”
The company was launched in secret, but news of its existence came to light after Faraday Future filed a lawsuit accusing the new company of the theft of trade secrets.
Now, Canoo is rounding out its executive team and pushing forward with plans to bring prototype vehicles to market by the end of the year.
Olivier Bellin joined the company as its head of operations from STMicroelectronics, a Geneva-based semiconductor company where he served as chief financial officer of the company’s U.S. operations.
Former president of BMW manufacturing Clemens Schmitz-Justen also joined the company as its head of manufacturing — overseeing the contract manufacturing strategy, which will see the company outsource production of vehicles in the U.S. and China.
Canoo said that it intends to use a modular “skateboard” approach to its vehicle design where different form factors can rest atop its chassis. The company touts that its different cabins can be tailored to suit the needs of different customers — ranging from commuter vehicles, public or group transportation, delivery vehicles and private cars.
The company is also crafting its user interface and subscription services around its passengers and renters. To that end, Canoo has brought on James Cox, a former Uber executive in charge of product operations for the ride-hailing business’ rider application, who will be developing digital products for the company’s initial customers, according to a March statement.
Initially, Canoo will target customers in Los Angeles and the Bay Area, with additional plans to expand to San Diego and Seattle when the company brings its commercial vehicles to market in 2021.
Canoo plans to use blockchain technology to secure its subscription services and ensure an asset-light approach to development by outsourcing its manufacturing in the U.S. and China, according to one person with knowledge of the company’s plans.
With the development of that subscription model, the car company is taking a page from the playbook other automakers are beginning to toy with. Despite the fact that Cadillac cancelled its Book subscription service late last year, companies like BMW, Volvo and Porsche have all pressed on with their experiments with subscriptions.
As it rolls out its subscription service, Canoo is targeting a lower price point than its competitors for its fully electric and “autonomous-ready” vehicles.
At the end of the day the company believes that there are more than 35 cities around the world that are suitable for its offering.
And now that the lawsuits are over and Faraday Future continues to wobble, it seems that plans for Canoo are gathering steam.
The rebranding effort, and the company’s new name itself, is indicative of its goals.
“We picked Canoo because it sounds distinctive, looks cool and creates a feeling of both relaxation and movement,” said Krause, in a statement. “For thousands of years, a canoe has been a simple, sustainable transportation device used all over the world.”
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Linear Labs, a startup developing an electric motor for cars, scooters, robots, wind turbines and even HVAC systems, has raised $4.5 million in a seed round led by Science Inc. and Kindred Ventures.
Investors Chris and Crystal Sacca, Ryan Graves of Saltwater Ventures, Dynamic Signal CEO Russ Fradin, Masergy executive chairman and former-CEO Chris MacFarland, as well as Ustream co-founder Gyula Feher also participated in the round.
The four-year-old company was founded by Brad and Fred Hunstable, who say they have invented a lighter, more flexible electric motor. The pair came up with the motor they’ve dubbed the Hunstable Electric Turbine (HET) while working to design a device that could pump clean water and provide power for small communities in underdeveloped regions of the world.
Linear Labs currently has 50 filed patents, 21 of which are issued, with 29 patents pending.
The founders come with a background in entrepreneurship and electrical engineering. Brad Hunstable is former CEO and founder of Ustream, the live-video-streaming service that sold to IBM in 2016 for $150 million. Fred Hunstable, who comes with a background in electrical engineering and nuclear power, led Ebasco and Walker Engineering’s efforts in designing, upgrading and completing electrical infrastructure, environmental and enterprise projects as well as safety and commercial-grade evaluation programs.
The HET uses multiple rotors that can adapt to varying conditions, according to the company. It also produces twice as much torque density and three times the power density than permanent magnet motors. Linear Labs says its motor produces two times the output per given motor size, and minimum 10 percent more range.
The HET design makes it ideally suited for mobility applications such as electric vehicles because it produces high levels of torque without the need for a gearbox. This helps cut production cuts, the company contends.
“The holy grail in electric motors has always been high torque and no gearbox, and the HET achieves both in a smaller, lighter and more efficient package that is more powerful than traditional motors,” Linear Labs CTO Fred Hunstable said in a statement.
The upshot could be electric vehicles with better range and more powerful electric scooters.
The commercialization of the electric motor will result in substantial leaps in terms of energy savings, reliability enhancement, and low-cost manufacturing, according to Babak Fahimi, founding director of the Renewable Energy and Vehicular Technology (REVT) Laboratory at the University of Texas at Dallas.
The company plans to use the seed funding to market its invention to customers. It’s also hiring talent and recently added new people to its leadership team, including John Curry as their president and Jon Hurry as vice president. Curry comes from KLA-Tencor and NanoPhotonics. Hurry has held positions at Tesla and Faraday Future.
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Faraday Future recently abandoned plans to build its own tailor-made factory from scratch in Nevada, and now it’s signed a lease on a new ready-made production facility in Hanford, Calif. The switch in strategy reflects a broader shift in the electric carmaker’s approach, which has been scaled down for earlier ambitious and lofty goals based on the company’s economic… Read More
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Faraday Future, the would-be Tesla rival facing well-documented challenges in terms of capitalization and efforts to bring its first production vehicle to market, has scrapped plans to construct an assembly facility and “experience center” (read: showroom) in Vallejo, California on Mare Island. Read More
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Faraday Future is scaling back some of its ambitions, according to Reuters, taking its planed product portfolio from seven electric vehicles to just two, and also reducing the size of its planned assembly factory in Nevada. The factory size reduction was confirmed by a North Las Vegas city manager, and will see the facility occupy less than a third of its original planned footprint. The… Read More
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How do you prove you’re serious about making electric cars? A partnership with one of the suppliers currently producing batteries at scale for shipping vehicles is a good start. Faraday Future announced such a union today, with a new agreement with LG Chem, the lithium-ion cell manufacturer that provides the powerhouses for vehicles including the Chevrolet Bolt EV. The partnership… Read More
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Electric car company Faraday Future unveiled its first concept car, the FFZero1, at CES 2016 this evening in Las Vegas, Nevada. And true to earlier leaked images, it looks a lot like the Batmobile. Faraday says they see this vehicle as more of a “car of concepts” than just a singular concept car. Along with the FFZERO1, the company revealed a variable platform architecture… Read More
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Whoops. Faraday Future — the super mysterious electric car company that no one really seems to know much about — is all set to debut something tonight… and it seems that something might’ve just leaked. An app called “Faraday Future Concept” briefly hit the app store this morning, complete with concept images and slides describing a “1000… Read More
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NextEv, a Chinese electric car company potentially taking on Tesla and Faraday Future, has tapped Padmasree Warrior for the U.S. CEO position. Warrior will also head up software development and the user experience globally for the Shanghai-based company.
According to Warrior, NextEv has already pulled in half a billion dollars of the $1 billion it plans to raise from the likes of Sequoia… Read More
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