AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)02/24 Report--

After eight years of car-building, Jia Yueting's dream of building a car finally came to an end-- FF91, the first model of FF, was officially put off the line.

At 8: 00 a. M. Beijing time on February 24th, FF announced its production plan for its first quasi-production model, the FF91, via live broadcast online. At the meeting, FF announced that the future Faraday factory in Handford has been completed, and the FF91 model has entered the final verification stage and will be put into production. FF said that in the four years since the launch of the FF91 model, many of the new cars have been upgraded so that pre-purchased consumers will not wait, and that the FF91 model will be put into production in the third quarter of this year.

As the founder of FF, Jia Yueting personally attended the press conference and test-drove the quasi-production version of FF91. Jia Yueting said bluntly: the 100km acceleration of the FF91 model far exceeds that of the luxury sports car Maybach, but also surpasses some Ferrari models, and then will go all out to promote the mass production of the model.

At the same time, Jia Yueting sighed for a long time: "over the years, with the continuous upgrading of FF 91 from design to hardware to software, the first quasi-production car has finally been completed!" For all futurists, this is an unforgettable moment. This is the fourth milestone in the production and manufacturing of the FF Hanford plant and a big step towards the timely and high quality delivery of the Smart Technology luxury FF 91 by Q3.

According to previous reports from the automotive industry, the FF was founded in 2013, and the FF91 is the first new model of FF. The car was first launched in Las Vegas in January 2017. it locates a high-end luxury electric vehicle with an acceleration of 0-60 mph in 2.39 seconds, can output 1050 horsepower, can drive 300 + miles on a single charge, and has a range of up to 700km under NEDC operating conditions. The price is $200000 in the US market and $2 million in the Chinese market. On July 22nd, 2021, FF officially landed on Nasdaq. On the day of listing, FF said that it would deliver FF91 within the next 12 months, but shortly after listing, FF was shorted. American short seller J Capital Research Mechkin Investment said that FF was an emerging electric car scam and could not sell a car. When questioned, Jia Yueting responded: "Hot stir-fry of cold rice is nonsense." In July 2022, Hanford, California, see the birth of new species. "

On February 2, a special committee of independent directors set up by FF said that there was no evidence to support the short-selling report of J Capital Research, the previous short seller, and that the 8Muk document submitted to SEC by a special committee made up of FF's independent board of directors showed that FF had received more than 14000 bookings for FF91 vehicles. This may be misleading because only a few hundred of these bookings have been paid, while the others (a total of 14000) have not been paid. Affected by this, FF CEO Bi Fukang and Jia Yueting were both asked for a 25 per cent pay cut. Since FF was shorted, FF also received a delisting warning letter from Nasdaq. FF said FF failed to submit its financial results on time due to inaccurate allegations from US short sellers, and there have been doubts about the FF car-building process. Now, with the first FF91 quasi-production car offline, FF may be able to effectively respond to market questions.

So far, however, FF has shown only a "quasi-production car". Last October, FF set seven important production milestones for FF91 mass production, while FF91 has completed only four milestones so far. From the first announcement of the FF91 model by FF in 2017 to the announcement today that it will be put into mass production in the third quarter of this year, from the point of view of time, compared with other car brands, the road for FF to build a car is extremely long, and the production plan has skipped tickets many times during the construction period. In the next five months, FF has three production milestones to be completed. According to the plan announced by FF, the seventh final milestone is FF91 production in the third quarter of this year. However, whether the FF91 can achieve mass production in the third quarter of this year is still a question mark. Although Jia Yueting has stressed many times in the past that the FF91 model will be delivered on time and with high quality in July this year, based on the current development of FF, FF is still full of uncertainties. Whether FF91 can achieve mass production or not may not be known until the third quarter of this year.

As of the close of US stocks, FF closed at $4.74 per share, down 6.32%, with a total market capitalization of 1.537 billion. Compared with the market capitalization of $4.5 billion on the day of FF's IPO on July 22 last year, only about half a year ago, FF's market value has "shrunk."

Public data show that at present, FF has planned three models, including the most high-end FF91 model mentioned above, and the other two models are positioned as high-end mass market FF81 models and mass market FF71 models, of which FF81 and FF71 are expected to achieve mass production by the end of 2023 and 2024 respectively. According to FF, after FF91 is officially offline FF plans to start producing more quasi-production cars at its plant in Hanford, Calif., later this year for final engineering verification and certification. FF CEO Bi Fukang said that FF will produce its second electric car, the FF81, in South Korea in 2024, and FF is expected to be profitable by 2025.

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