Image source @ Visual China
FunTalk, author || He Yiran, editor | Wang Fangjie
Maybe it's a coincidence, or maybe it's retaliation for Trevor Milton's years of trampling. In October, Musk announced that Tesla's pure electric truck Semi was officially put into production, which will be delivered to its first customer, PepsiCo, in December. In addition, PGE, UPS and Walmart have also placed orders.
And Trevor Milton is the founder of Nikola Motor Company. Just as Tesla took the last name of scientist and inventor Nikola Tesla, Nikola took the name of the entrepreneurial icon.
In 2014, when Musk and Tesla continued to create new business miracles, an entrepreneur named Trevor Milton was inspired.
Previously, the alarm sales company and used car sales website he founded had failed, and although he did not understand any technology, he understood very well that entrepreneurship needed to follow the wind. In the vast number of startups, if you want to be noticed by investors, you must directly benchmark the most popular companies in the industry.
Thus, the Nikolai Motor Company was officially established.
Just like the name, Nikolai has to do everything with Tesla, Tesla focuses on lithium-ion battery power, and Nikolai focuses on hydrogen fuel cell power; Since Tesla has established a firm foothold in the field of new energy cars, Nikolai has taken a different path and chose trucks with a high number of holdings in the US market as the main category...
In addition to Nikolai's hydrogen truck, which was later exposed as a hoax, Milton himself was charged with multiple crimes.
On October 14, local time, after four weeks of evidence collection and six hours of court deliberation, a US federal jury found Milton, 40, guilty of one count of securities fraud and two counts of wire fraud. It is reported that Milton's verdict will be released by January 2023, and the maximum sentence may be 20 years.
In essence, the formation of the Nicholas bubble is a testimony to a glitzy era. In that era, there was a surplus of capital, a surplus of PPT, and a surplus of scammers. So bragging does not need to be taxed, but it can be financed, listed, and let a group of people follow and get rich.
And in order to maintain basic decency, everyone is like being in "The Emperor's New Clothes" until a child appears.
01
In 2016, Nikola launched the heavy-duty truck Nikola Generation; In 2019, an upgraded Nikolai II was launched. According to Milton's publicity, its new energy truck has a cruising range of 500-700 miles, and when fully loaded, the acceleration time of 0-60 km/h is 30 seconds, which is only 50% of the time required by diesel vehicles of the same class, and the load capacity reaches 80,000lbs.
Milton makes every press conference full of atmosphere, and the Nikolai truck unveiled in smoke will even give the audience a sci-fi sense of "Autobots", and the good performance of the truck in the promotional video is also very infectious.
In addition, he released the Nikola Tre tractor truck and the Nikola Zero utility electric 4WD off-road vehicle as a complement to the company's product matrix.
Despite skepticism about the true state of Nikolai's hydrogen technology, Milton focused his propaganda on the broad prospects of the truck market. 71% of the goods in the U.S. economy are transported by trucks, which play an important role in the transportation network. In Milton's portrayal, Nikolai will become the Tesla of the truck world.
Nikolai's aggressiveness once made Musk feel anxious. In 2017, Tesla released the Semi, an electric truck prototype, in response to market demand. Later, Nikolai also sued Semi for infringement, claiming $2 billion.
At the beginning of 2020, without selling a single car, Nikolai received $2 billion in financing from General Motors and successfully went public through a backdoor listing with the halo of "Tesla second". Before the listing, Nikolai claimed to have won orders for 14,000 vehicles and potential sales of more than $10 billion.
On the day of listing, the company's stock price soared 104%, and then its market value once exceeded 34 billion US dollars, beating the old car giant Ford. At that time, some people even ridiculed that "Nikola Tesla" finally achieved the origin of a hundred years ago and wanted to dominate the automobile manufacturing industry. On the most beautiful days, Milton made a boastful statement: "There are few people in this world who can surpass Musk, and I am one of them." ”
However, the bubble will burst one day.
In September 2020, a report thrown by short-selling agency Hindenburg Research directly knocked Nikolai back to its original shape.
Investigators testified that the prototype unveiled at the Nikolai generation press conference was simply a model that could not be really used, and in order to turn on the lights at the unveiling, the prototype car was even connected to wires at the launch; In the trailer, the truck is driven at a flat high-speed with the model placed on a hillside so that it glides by gravity; The company's order volume is even more moisture.
After the news broke, GM abandoned the deal with Nikolai, and the performance of the Nikolai market was sluggish. Currently, Nikolai's market capitalization is only $1.3 billion.
02
In 2021, Milton announced his departure and was subsequently sued in federal court.
"This is a clear fraud," prosecutors said. This case should serve as a warning to anyone who acts rashly on the truth in order to get investors to give up their money that there will be no good ending. ”
During the trial, several former employees of Nikolai testified in court.
One engineer said his job in Nikolai was to connect off-the-shelf converters to Nikola trucks and cover the original labels with masking tape to make the devices look like Nikolai's patented products. With no one in the company working on hydrogen fuel technology, Milton confidently promoted the company's hydrogen technology at the press conference.
Milton came from a Mormon family, and the image of Mormons wearing white shirts as missionaries around the world is deeply rooted in people's hearts. Prior to starting his business, Milton spent 2 years as a missionary in Brazil. Some former employees believe that the missionary has honed Milton's eloquence and sales skills, and for him, there is nothing that cannot be sold.
In the case of only concepts, Milton fooled auto parts company Bosch, hydrogen equipment manufacturer Nel, photovoltaic manufacturer Hanwha to reach a strategic cooperation with Nikolai, allowing industry giants to endorse themselves.
In contrast, Milton has now pleaded not guilty to all charges, saying: "I'm not doing anything wrong, I'm just talking about business plans." Milton's lawyer claimed he was a "victim" of the short deal.
Nicholas tried to distance itself from Milton.
Nikola stressed that the current charges are only against Milton personally, not the company, and "we remain committed to our previously announced milestones and timelines and focus on delivering the Nikola Tre battery electric truck from the manufacturing facility later this year." "Before the criminal trial begins, the company has agreed to pay a $125 million fine to the SEC to settle allegations of misleading investors about products, technological advancements and business prospects.
Even Nikolai's current CEO, Mark Russell, testified that he had been deceived by joining the company and learning that Nikola I was released without gas turbines or fuel cells.
Currently, Nikolai has about 900 employees at its headquarters in Phoenix. In April this year, after several delays, Nikolai finally came up with the Nikola Tre, a mass-produced all-electric truck, but the cumulative delivery is said to be only 93 units.
According to the latest financial report, Nikolai's revenue in the second quarter of this year was 18.13 million US dollars, although the revenue figure is not eye-catching, but it has improved significantly from the zero performance of the same period last year. In the financial report, Nikolai said that it will deliver 300-500 electric trucks this year and will start construction of the first hydrogen production center, which is expected to reach 20,000 units in 2023.
03
Of course, the bubble of Nikolai cars is caused by the impetuosity of the market eagerly looking for the "next Tesla", but to some extent, Milton's idea of choosing trucks as a subdivision track does capture the pain points of the industry and comply with market demand, otherwise it would not be possible for so many industry insiders to be willing to gamble.
In 2021, Rivian, an electric vehicle company known as "Tesla's fierce rival", successfully went public after receiving investment from Bezos. Rivian's main products are pure electric pickup trucks and pure electric SUVs, which can be used as travel vehicles and small pickups that are easy to transport goods, which are very suitable for American consumer tastes. Ten days after its listing, Rivian topped $104.8 billion in market capitalization, and it hadn't delivered a single car yet.
In many ways, Rivian's miracle in the capital market is a copy of Nikolai, except that Rivian actually came up with a production tram after that, although a total of 920 were delivered in 2021.
In addition, Milton's choice of hydrogen energy as a force point also cuts to the demands of some people.
Tesla has always scoffed at hydrogen. Musk has repeatedly called the idea of hydrogen fuel cells extremely stupid. In May, he again stated: "If humans are looking for a new way to store energy, hydrogen is the worst option." ”
Although the mainstream of the global market is inclined to lithium batteries, there have been manufacturers trying to overcome hydrogen fuel cells. Under the green concept, hydrogen energy is more environmentally friendly than lithium batteries. Hydrogen fuel refueling is faster than charging, high energy density, light weight, and the cruising range is generally longer, and the long cruising range is just in line with the use scenario of the truck.
By the end of 2021, there were about 50,000 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in the world, and the strategy of the vast majority of companies specializing in hydrogen vehicles was to compete differently with electric vehicles and target the market of traditional diesel engines. In terms of strategic direction, the choice given by Milton and Nikolai is the general consensus of people in the industry who do not want to do similar things with Tesla and want to make breakthroughs in hydrogen energy, which also made Nikolai once a "watchman" of hydrogen energy. It's just that Milton doesn't have real technology and is bragging too much.
Therefore, after the counterfeiting was exposed, there are still manufacturers willing to continue to cooperate with Nikolai. In the eyes of some investors, sweeping Milton out of the house, hydrogen trucks may be more likely to actually launch.
However, even Nikolai's first truck products to achieve mass production are electric truck Tre, and hydrogen energy technology really lacks the hard power to compete with electric vehicles at present.
At present, many companies have poured into the new energy truck track. After losing the unique label of hydrogen fuel, Nikolai can be said to have no bright spot in the current market competition, and the only advantage left is the "notoriety" laid down by Milton.