I don’t' want them to fail, I just don't believe there's a) a market for the numbers they want to sell in North America and b) It's been shown their business plan is laughable.
A vehicle like this should really be electric. 84 mpg doesn't make sense when full sizes electric cars with 4 seats and daily usable range are getting over 100mpg equivalent, so something as small as this could be getting way way better equiv mpg than that. The range wouldn't be an issue as this is never going to be an interstate cruiser beyond someone driving coast to coast just because.
If they want to make it gas why try and re-invent the wheel and build their own engine from scratch. The massive R&D for that can never be supported for a startup who's never built anything, let alone an engine before. Other new and smallish manufacturers buy or share engines. Hell, major manufacturers share engines. Polaris with the Slingshot are probably the closest to the Elio in general layout and market even if they are a sports vehicle and not a eco commuter. They have 60 years’ experience building motorized vehicles and engines and for the slingshot they are buying and engine from GM.
Suzuki, Daihatsu, VAG, Subaru, Mercedes, PAG all make 3 cyle auto engines plus god knows how many suitable bike engines of different configuration and drive system are available they could buy off the shelf.
Their projected price is unreasonable for the level of R&D, their dealer model doesn't stack up. Their warranty costs assumptions are laughable.
As I said, I really think Paul Elio set out with the best of intentions. With the economic climate, climate change, mega cities, parking, congestions etc. I think if his business plan and product had the slimmest possibility of actually being able to be produced he would have found a backer 5, 6 or even 7 years ago. HE's a dreamer who I know think is milking people of money he knows in his heart will never deliver a product just to keep his dream alive and his paycheck rolling in.
The Tata Nano, the world’s cheapest new car at $2,500 has flopped in India with a population of 1.3 Billion people. They’ve sold less than 2.5million of them since 2009 and the price is now $3,700+. That had the might of Tata behind it with a revenue of over $108Billion that’s $108,000,000,000. That has a unique 2 cyle engine 31hp and there are probably tens of thousands laying around going cheap since they have a production volume of 2.5million a year and haven’t sold that in 7 years.
What does the Elio claim it’s going to have that the NAno didn’t/doesn’t
2 external mirrors
A/C
ABS
Air bag
Crush structure
Radio
Filler cap
Instruments other than a speedo
Automatic transmission
Etc. etc.
Now, some of that is available with the price rising to $3700+, but Tata can’t make this work when they were planning to write off the R&D over 20-30 million units. How is Elio supposed to do this starting from scratch with nothing over a (most people agree massively optimistic) 250,000 units a year?
Look at the Renault Twizzy. It’s got the might of Renault behind it (Revenue over $40,000,000,000 depending on the exchange rate) and its base price is over $7,000 at today’s exchange rate. For the Twizzy even the doors are optional. The sales market is Europe which has a larger population than the US, but the automotive market is broadly similar with a peak in 07 of 15.5million and 2015 sales of 14million. Yes, it’s smaller that here, but in the ball park. Europe is also far far more environmentally conscious than the US and has a way bigger congestion problem and more and more cities with congestion charges and roadblocks (literal and metaphorical) to traditional cars. The Twizzy is perfect for the market place and would be more popular there than the Elio would be here. How many have they sold compared to Elio’s claimed 250,000 per year target? 9,020 in 2012 the first year down to 3,025 in 2013. Draw your own conclusions.
You guys have a different perspective than I do, thanks for the discussion.
