New York is stuck with an EV fleet of $ 45 million that is glitchy like hell

There is green for the planet, then there is green as part of a political initiative which ends up buying a bunch of electric vehicles in the gripch from a company that has gone bankrupt and can no longer serve them.

The latter is the exact story of a company based in New York called American Lease, which spent around $ 45 million for 2,800 Fisker cars, a now dead startup that has only been 11,000 of this model in its short life anyway, and now uses them as part of the Green Rides of NYC initiative.

Consequently, they deployed the ocean, a kind of KNOCKOFF of the Escalade SUV, through NYC as a carpooling or car service vehicle, which means that the only ocean you could see in your life has appeared several times in New York.

And like True Tech Bro, the decision to buy these nearly 3,000 SURs now missing for millions of dollars has been taken quickly – and broke things, perhaps literally.

“We were sitting in lunch and I was reading an article on how Henrik Fisker, who founded Fisker, had listed his house for more than the market capitalization of the company at that time,” said US executive vice-president Josh Bleiberg. “So I said to myself, ‘screw it: let’s buy Fisker.'”

Fisker cars are all kinds of mess

Here is the problem, however: the ocean made its debut in 2020 and was immediately slapped by regulators for several security problems, a problem which finally led to a reminder of all the 2024 models and to the bankruptcy of Fisker the same year.

Fisker produced more than 10,000 oceanic SUVs in 2023, but only 4,929 of these vehicles were delivered to customers. Fisker was also faced with challenges in the sale of the remaining inventory, an understandable position taking into account recall problems.

These problems included a sudden loss of energy, the inability to leave in an emergency, problems with gauges and icons on the dashboard, software that did not meet the security requirements, the brakes that do not work and the movement of “involuntary” vehicles.

“A door that does not open can prevent the occupants from going out in an emergency, increasing the risk of injury,” the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said in its conclusions.

A Bloomberg journalist who recently took a tour in one noted that you should certainly look for the “ghost light” – which continues at random, then flashes for 10 to 15 seconds before reset – or Californian mode, which sometimes causes windows trapped in a decline and must then be reset to the Bronx site of the company.

Another fun advantage? Vehicles are often old, with their software in limbo, managed by third -party startups like Indigo Technologies, which try to keep them up to date. No word on the way you solve a major problem with an ocean, because the company that made it died, and it was the only model that Fisker has ever made.

This makes sense because after the recall of 2024, the owners of the cars said that Fisker’s development engineers were running to meet the regulatory requirements and made so many changes so quickly that many of them did not work at all. This led to accusations of “brickly”, that is to say when an EV becomes completely insensitive.

To what extent did American rental paid Fisker cars?

To be fair, the American rental had a good deal on Fisker cars. While they once sold around $ 70,000 as luxury electric vehicles, the company took them for about $ 16,000 each. However, whether this price is taken into account in recall problems or repair costs, is not clear.

American rental did not respond to a request for comments.

What is remarkable is that the New York push for an electric fleet – surrounded by the Green Rides of the City initiative – inadvertently created a market for these Zombie EV startups.

The city aims that all Uber and Lyft rides are no longer emissions by 2030, but the limited offer and the drop in federal incentives have let fleet operators fall back for affordable replacements, often turning to used and supported vehicles of bankrupt or faulty companies. The irony in this is that the owner of American Leasing does not think that the oceans will do so until this deadline of 2030.

“We are not planning that these cars lasted 150,000 to 200,000 miles,” Bleiberg told Bloomberg.