Fisker Inc., a company that describes itself as a designer and manufacturer of the "world’s most emotion-stirring, eco-friendly electric vehicles," has announced a memorandum of understanding with Foxconn to develop a new electric vehicle.
Codenamed "Project PEAR" — Personal Electric Automotive Revolution — the plan calls for Fisker and Foxconn to collaborate on a new vehicle. Foxconn hopes to make more than 250,000 Pears per year, with production starting as soon as Q4 2023. The vehicles will initially target markets in North America, Europe, China and India.
The vehicle will be the second introduced by the Fisker brand following the launch of the Ocean SUV in Q4 2022.
The Ocean is an electric SUV starting at $37,499 with a solar sunroof and an interior made from upcycled materials like recycled fishing nets and old t-shirts. They call it a "tech romance between machine and planet," so at least they have a quality creative writer on the payroll.
Fisker claims to have more than 12,000 paid reservations for the Ocean, and plans to unveil a production-intent prototype later this year. The Ocean will initially be manufactured exclusively by Magna International in Europe
Foxconn, which is known for assembling iPhones and iPads for Apple, offers Fisker some enticing advantages — primarily its global supply chain, which could be key to the development of electric motors, electric control modules and batteries.
Foxconn promises to bring lessons learned from the information and communications technology industry to the automotive side, and it definitely has the same aggressive product development timelines. Within a 24-month window, Project PEAR plans to go from research and development to production, which is in line with the auto industry’s increasingly demanding time-to-market expectations.
Next, teams from Fisker and Foxconn will discuss design, technology, engineering and manufacturing in an effort to formalize the partnership in Q2 2021.
Fisker CEO Henrik Fisker provided a sketch that he says hints at the design, but it leaves a lot to the imagination. Fisker Inc. is Henrik Fisker’s second go at an auto company after Fisker Automotive went bankrupt in 2013.
We’ll see if the Project PEAR promises to be emotion-stirring. If anything, let’s just hope it’s not a lemon.
Update: According to the Wall Street Journal, Henrik Fisker said Foxconn’s facilities in Wisconsin would be an “obvious” site for manufacturing operations. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports although Foxconn has not stated that production would happen in Wisconsin, it didn't rule out the possibility.