Long-troubled Faraday Future has a new sub-brand and big plans. But a cloud still hangs over the EV company.
Max Ma's hopeful vision and bright-eyed optimism is compelling. The CEO of Faraday Future's sub-brand, Faraday X, laid out a narrative of a dogged company, overcoming a decade of obstacles to achieve production of its first product, then moving on to higher-volume segments. He promises affordable electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids ranging from $20,000 to $50,000. He promises a deeply integrated AI experience. It's hopeful, it makes sense and now is the right time to do it.
But to believe in it, you have to believe in Faraday Future. That's no small order.
You may be somewhat familiar with that name. The full tapestry of Faraday Future's history eludes most; it stretches over more than a decade's worth of corporate takeover politics, geopolitical intrigue and undelivered promises. Those promises typically came from Faraday Future's founder, Yueting "YT" Jia. He was once hailed as one of China's greatest internet entrepreneurs, but is now not especially welcome in his home country after failing to repay his considerable debts.
But if you do know the company, you probably know the FF 91.
Unveiled at CES in 2017, the FF91 promised 1,000-plus horsepower, 378 miles of electric range and Level 4 autonomous driving. Those are the sorts of wild technologies we'd expect from one of China's best EV makers today, but Faraday Future once said it would go to production sometime in 2018 at a planned Nevada factory—one built from the ground-up, not a retrofitted old plant like those used by Tesla and Rivian in their early days.
"His role is pretty important. He's the founder of the company," Aydt, the global CEO, told InsideEVs. "He has given his ideas to the products. So from that perspective, he's an essential and crucial element for our leadership team. He's reporting in parallel to me, directly to the board, so his role is focusing very much on product and the user ecosystem."
He wasn't concerned about Jia's personal issues, either, describing them as just that: personal. Aydt noted that Faraday Future has no further exposure to any issues in Jia's personal life. Both Aydt and Ma also emphasized that they believe Jia was a good person, and that they trusted him.
The question, then, is whether shareholders, customers and critics should share that trust.
The Faraday Future team at the FF 91's start of production.
Where Does FF Go From Here?
Ma directly appealed for more positivity around the brand, a bizarre ask for a CEO speaking to the media. He painted a picture of resilience, of pushing through when everyone doubted. He has been at the company from the beginning, then lived through an attempted corporate takeover, the failure of the Nevada plant and, eventually, the launch of the FF 91. He's still scrapping, still trying to make it work.
I noted that from our perspective, it was hard to lend FF credibility. I don't want to mislead my audience, and FF has given the public little reason to trust it. Ma understands.
"We have been trained, with big hearts, with resilience, with hard [work.] We also want to have this big opportunity to prove that we can do it again, right?" Ma told InsideEVs.
That's YT Jia on the right.
He added: "There's also activities about a reputational issue. But today we have cleared up all those issues. It's all behind us. We want to have a fresh start."
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