Karma Chameleon
A New Breed of Hybrid - “The Karma makes a statement about how good-looking an alternative vehicle could be, and essentially redefines luxury.”
The Karma cuts a dramatic profile – with its long hood, short rear deck, low roofline, and wide stance anchored by 22-inch wheels and tires. A continuously formed glass solar panel roof, the world’s largest on an automobile, harnesses additional energy from the sun and lends a cool eco-aesthetic. Exclusively offered Diamond Dust exterior paint gets its glimmer from crushed recycled glass and highlights the car’s sculptural form.
The spacious interior incorporates conventional hallmarks of luxury sedans, rendering them through innovative solutions aligned with the car’s environmentally conscious attitude. For example, inlaid wood trim is fashioned of naturally fallen trees recovered from forest fires and lake bottoms, and sumptuous leather is processed using a 100 percent sustainable manufacturing strategy. The battery pack nestled between, rather than underneath, the passengers allows for a lower rear seating position and maximizes the interior package for first-class, private jet-style comfort.
Leonardo DiCaprio Believes In Karma
The 37-year-old actor and an equity investor in Fisker Automotive announced on his Foundation on July 3rd that he will be working closely with the luxury hybrid and electric car company to bring attention to sustainability and environmental awareness.
“My foundation supports efforts to secure a sustainable future for our planet and all its inhabitants,” Leo said in a statement. “I am delighted to be working with Fisker Automotive to promote this shared vision.”
The Inception actor, who received a Fisker Karma back in 2011, will promote the sedan as an environmentally friendly vehicle.
According to Fisker Automotive website, “the Karma is the world’s first premium electric plug-in hybrid representing the company’s firm belief that environmentally conscious cars need not sacrifice passion, style, or performance”.
PHOTO CREDIT: Max Shelton/Getty
Shocker: An electric car company actually meets production goals (and yes, it’s Tesla)
#SuryaRay #Surya Once again electric car pioneer Tesla Motors is the lone firm out of its electric car peers that says it’s going to do something, and then actually (usually) does it. According to Automotive News, Tesla has now reached its goal of producing 400 Model S electric cars per week, or around 20,000 cars per year.
This rate of production has been Tesla’s goal for months — if not years — and it’s a big step on the company’s path to profitability this year. Back in November, during its latest quarterly earnings, Tesla said it was on track to reach this milestone after having to scale back its original production goals a couple months earlier in September. It also means that all those customers on the waiting list to get their Model S cars — there were 13,200 as of the third quarter — will get their cars sooner, rather than later.
However, as I’ve written before, Tesla seems to be the exception rather than the rule in the struggling world of independent electric car makers and batteries made for electric cars. Electric car infrastructure maker Better Place shuffled out its second CEO in as many months last week, and laid off a big chunk of staff in the face of very slow adoption of its electric car service in Israel.
Electric car startup Fisker hasn’t made any of its hybrid electric Karma cars in months, and is looking for a Chinese partner, investor or acquirer with deep pockets to offer it a lifeline. Fisker’s original production goal at the beginning of its life was 5,000 Karmas in 2011, and it’s made around 1,900. A123 Systems, which has been making batteries for Fisker’s Karma, went bankrupt last year and then was bought by Chinese auto tech giant Wanxiang.
For the auto giants like GM and Nissan, which have been making their own mainstream electric cars, production isn’t a problem. It’s just that sales are a little slow. GM sold a total of 23,461 Volts in 2012, up from the 7,671 sold in 2011, and Nissan sold 9,819 Leafs in 2012, according to AutoblogGreen. GM originally wanted to sell 45,000 Volts in 2012.
So why is it so hard for independent electric car companies to meet their targets, and large auto makers to hit sales targets? For the auto giants, the market is only just emerging. GM’s Volt and the Nissan LEAF are the first mass produced plug-in battery cars on the market in the U.S. Auto exec Bob Lutz, who kickstarted GM’s Volt and is now on the board of some startups, says the transition to electric cars will be very slow.
For independent car startups, commercial scale production can be daunting and take a lot longer than expected, too. Many things can go wrong, and the it can take months to streamline the process of auto manufacturing. Tesla was founded back in 2003, and its pilot car — where it made errors and suffered delays — was the original Roadster. It’s taken Tesla this many years to get to its closer to mainstream auto maker status just pushing out 400 cars per week.
Sorry I’m spamming so much but I have things to say. Dave works for an automobile company called Fisker Automotive (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisker_Automotive) working on the computers for their cars, specifically the Karma. Leonardo DiCaprio and Colin Powell have received their Karmas so that’s totes cool. :B I’m so proud of my science-y smart Dave.
“But it is clear that the remaining managers face grim circumstances, not the least of which is an April 22 deadline to repay a portion of a $193 million low-interest loan from the United States Department of Energy. Although Fisker was granted a $528.7 million loan in late 2009, that money was frozen after Fisker fell short of its production targets.”
—Yet another Solyndra debacle to be paid for by U.S. taxpayers. Fisker Automotive Lays Off Majority of Employees - NYTimes.com
The Office of Workers' Compensation Programs
Seal of the United States Department of Energy. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
http://ping.fm/9Wuoc The Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs (OWCP) is publishing a list of Department of Energy (DOE) facilities covered under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000, as amended (EEOICPA). This notice revises and republishes the listing of DOE facilities that was last published by OWCP on November 24, 2010 (75 FR 71737) to include additional determinations made on this subject through March 6, 2012.
LaSorda, Former Chrysler boss named CEO at Fisker
LaSorda, 57, Chrysler’s former CEO, had been named vice chairman of the automaker late last year.
Company co-founder and CEO Henrik Fisker will become executive chairman, the company said in a statement.
“I will be taking a new role…building the brand and creating brand awareness, styling and design and future vision of the company,” Fisker said.
Although it has launched its $103,000 Karma extended-range hybrid vehicle, the company recently missed milestones to collect its next round of funding from the U.S. Department of Energy.
Development of its lower-priced Project Nina has been placed on temporary hold.
However, LaSorda said that Fisker Automotive will be profitable in 2013 from Karma sales alone. Hopefully, that revelation will be enough to spur the next round of financing, either from the DOE or other sources, LaSorda said.
LaSorda also hinted at the possibility of forming an alliance with another automaker.
“If any auto company would call, we would be open to that,” LaSorda said. “But we are not out in the marketplace pushing that.”
Fisker has built — through the Valmet Automotive assembly plant in Finland — about 2,000 Karmas. About 840 have been delivered to U.S. and Canadian dealers. European dealers started receiving Karmas last week.
As for Project Nina, LaSorda said, “I really can’t say when production would start and what’s going on in Wilmington.” Late last year, Henrik Fisker said that prototype production at Wilmington would begin in the second half of 2012.Automobile News
