In a sense, Jia Yueting did create a precedent for new domestic car-making forces, in fact, his Faraday Future (hereinafter referred to as FF) was founded in 2014.
The man, who had shouted "suffocate for dreams," said at the time that he wanted to build the best Internet-connected smart cars. But later, after the collapse of the LeTV empire, Jia Yueting left a promise in the United States that has never been fulfilled: "Return to China next week."
As the first product of FF, FF 91, released in 2017, has not been able to produce energy, and the news of insufficient funds, data fraud, and employee departure has been continuously exposed during the period. Today, Jia Yueting and his FF have long been reduced to the "talking point" of the industry after tea.
After experiencing expectations and helplessness again and again, we seem to be used to FF's "ticket jumping". But unexpectedly, Jia Yueting suddenly drove out in a FF 91.
Quasi-production cars off the production line, what is the difference?
On February 24, FF held a press conference at the Hanford plant to announce the completion of the FF 91 production-intent vehicle, and once again stressed that the FF 91 will achieve mass production in the third quarter of 2022.
At the press conference, a smiling Jia Yueting described the FF 91 like this:
It runs faster than the Maybach, even faster than most Ferraris.
Although pure trams and fuel vehicles are indeed a bit better than "who runs faster", the performance of the FF 91 is indeed excellent from the paper parameters alone: the combined maximum power is 1050 horsepower, the acceleration time of 0-96km/h is less than 2.4 seconds, and the cruising range is 700km under NEDC conditions.
On the other hand, Jia Yueting chose to compare with Maybach, perhaps to highlight another feature of the FF 91 - luxury.
Jia Yueting prepared 11 screens for his "global spire users", anti-gravity seats with various comfort functions, and even PDLC glass with adjustable transparency. At the same time, the 3.2-meter-long wheelbase also lays the foundation for "spatial performance beyond Maybach".
Carsten Breitfeld, FF's global CEO, also pointed out several improvements to the quasi-production model:
Front and rear headlights; front and rear trunks; new livery and tail markings; lidar.
Visually, the most obvious change in the FF 91 quasi-production car is the lidar on the roof. In previous versions, FF placed lidar that could be lifted and lowered automatically in the position of the front cover.
In addition, Bi Fukang also said that most of the components of this quasi-production car are close to mass production, FF is currently busy with the installation of production and assembly equipment, and they will produce more quasi-production vehicles in the next few months for final engineering verification and certification work.
FF can never sell a car?
According to Jia Yueting, FF has completed four major manufacturing milestones, the first three are:
Completed the installation of equipment to support the production of pre-production vehicles; obtained the final production qualification of the Hanford plant; and started the infrastructure construction of the remaining production areas.
Today's release of the FF 91 quasi-production car is their fourth manufacturing milestone. At this pace, it seems that FF can really mass-produce the FF 91 in the third quarter of this year.
But some people don't think so.
In October 2021, J Capital Research, a US short-selling agency, threw out a 28-page short selling report, questioning FF's ability to build cars, pointing directly at FF's market prospects and Jia Yueting's debt problems.
"We believe that Faraday Future will never sell a car," J Capital Research said in its report, "so far it's nothing more than a barrel of money raised from U.S. investors and then pouring money into a debt black hole created by its founder, Jia Yueting, China's best-known securities fraudster."
In the face of outside skepticism, Faraday Future's Special Committee of Independent Directors conducted a three-month investigation into the allegations and published the results on the second day of the Spring Festival in the Year of the Tiger.
The survey results show that the "FF 91 new car orders have reached 14,000 units" previously disclosed by FF officials is seriously inconsistent with the facts, and only 300 users have actually paid. Not only that, the Special Committee bluntly said: "Underestimating jia Yueting's involvement in the business."
▲ Image from: NBCNews
In other words, he is Jia Yueting's "own person" installed within the company.
In response to this company loophole, the board of directors also made some remedial measures, appointing Susan Swenson, who was previously the chairman of the audit committee, as executive chairman, Bi Fukang and Jia Yueting will report directly to Swenson, and cut their annual base salary by 25%, in addition, Wang Jiawei was also suspended.
On the capital level, as of the close of trading on February 24, EST, its share price closed at $4.74 per share, with a total market capitalization of $1.537 billion, a decline of nearly 70% compared to $4.5 billion at the time of listing.
Even so, FF still firmly said: mass production in the third quarter.
After going public, what does the FF 91 face?
In the two years after the release of FF 91, Weilai, Xiaopeng and Ideal have emerged, coupled with the efforts of traditional manufacturers and Tesla's turmoil, the domestic new energy vehicle market has long been different.
Even on the other side of the sea, Tesla, whose stock price is soaring, has secured a foothold in the U.S. market, and Rivian and Lucid are catching up fast, not to mention the two mountains of Ford and GM. Even if the luxury FF 91 is a selling point, it will inevitably be encircled by traditional luxury manufacturers in the near future.
In the face of the difficulties that are visible to the naked eye on the road ahead, the road of FF is not easy to walk.
▲ Image from: Mercedes-Benz
Jia Yueting once defined himself and FF as "adventurers who dare to promote the progress of human society and create an intelligent electric mobility ecology." He also left a message under Musk's Twitter: "We are comrades in the development of human science, not competitors."
But after comparing Tesla with FF, it is not difficult to find that Max and Jia Yueting have taken very different paths.
Musk once described Tesla's birth in a speech at the California Institute of Technology:
In the past, many people thought that electric cars were too slow, not far to run, and ugly in appearance, just like golf carts. To change people's impressions, we developed the Tesla Roadster, an electric sports car that is fast, runs far and has a pulling style.
So, to start a company, you have to actually prototype the product. Because, no matter how wonderful the paper work and PPT are, they are not as convincing as the actual products.
Yes, no matter how beautiful the PPT is, it is not as good as a real car.
*Unless otherwise noted, the remaining images are from Faraday Future.