Vacuum Cleaner Billionaire May Soon Launch Nebulous EV Product. Be Very Afraid.
My fourth grade teacher (RIP, Ruth Tindall) told our class in 1964 that good writers “hook” their readers with a snappy opening statement. How about this: Here’s a story of dubious value. Sorry, Mrs. Tindall, but I have to be honest.
British billionaire Sir James Dyson, who made his money with the bagless vacuum cleaner, is apparently establishing an organization that plans to launch a soon-to-be-defined EV into the market. From the article:
What the car going to be like? “We’ll be talking more about the vehicle but not until nearer the launch date.”
MSRP? “Pricing for the car was not disclosed. But Dyson told reporters it would be expensive.”
Other key ingredients in the puzzle: Speculation that Dyson might be developing an electric car has been rife since the company bought solid-state battery maker Sakti3 in October 2015. At the time, Dyson claimed the purchase was intended to improve battery technology for home appliances rather than stationary energy storage or electric-vehicle applications. Last year, though, a U.K. government slip-up revealed Dyson was working on electric vehicles after all.
OMG. My advice to BMW, BYD Auto, General Motors, Lexus, Mercedes-Benz, Renault, Tesla, Citroën, Fiat Automobiles, Mahindra & Mahindra, Honda, Nissan, Peugeot, Smart, Tesla, Toyota, Volkswagen and Volvo: Watch out. This guy could come along a suck up your market.
Craig,
I’m not sure if you’ve ever heard of the last British inventor to storm the EV market ?
Sir Clive Sinclair, who had made a fortune as an early computer/electronics developer poured his fortune into the idiotic and ill-fated Sinclair C5 EV. (I own three).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_C5
Naturally, the whole enterprise collapsed when the British government failed to support the enterprise, although the canny Sir Clive avoided most of the ensuing loses.
Sir James Dyson is with a doubt a brilliant man, and with $2 billion could develop a serious, expensive, low volume production EV marque.
In Japan there’s a large coach-builder that produces beautiful, expensive boulevard cruising, EV sports models. These sensational looking vehicles have a range of 300+ miles and terrific performance, but at nearly $500,000 each and a two years waiting list, the Chevy Bolt is pretty safe!
Over the decades the UK has produced some seriously good EV’s, some awful as well as some truly eccentric, weird and wonderful EV designs.