Helmond-based solar car maker Lightyear suspends car production, switches to building solar roofs
Helmond-based solar car maker Lightyear suspends car production, switches to building solar roofs
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This is a real bummer. I saw these guys on The Fully Charged Show a couple of years back and their first car looked incredibly promising. But the auto industry is not easy to break and investors know that. Hopefully the solar roofs will prove profitable enough for them to try again.
IIRC, part of the reason why and how they declared bankruptcy and restarted was because they then no longer had to fulfil any preorders (but also didn't pay customers back due to the bankruptcy). So customers got screwed over.
Car industry is difficult but these kinds of practices sound extremely fishy.
I was not aware of that! Thank you for mentioning it. It has always seemed crazy to me that customers have no charge over assets on bankruptcy. In a better world, that'd be the case but that's not the world we live in.
As an aside, this is the sort of thing that is going to hinder investment in small firms in the auto industry, further compiling the issue of a few manufacturers setting ridiculous prices for their vehicles.