But success is never a foregone conclusion. Dyson’s, which raised the white flag on its zero-emission car last October, is in fact only the latest of other major projects that was canceld.

Let’s stay for a moment on Sir James Dyson, who revealed a lot of insights about his electric car project at the Sunday Times.

Dyson is the wealthiest man in Britain and has built his empire on high performance appliances. Dyson decided to develop a project for an electric SUV, he built it and he also started the road tests. But after two years of intense work he gave up, putting the beauty of £500 million pounds (over €600 million – over $650) out of his own pocket.

The car signed by Dyson had a weight of 2.6 tons, an autonomy of 950 km, the ability to shoot from 0 to 100 km/h (0-62 mph) in 4.8 seconds. The project, started in 2017, gave work to 600 people and immediately aimed to undermine Tesla’s dominance in the field of zero emissions with a direct competitor of the Tesla Model X.

It did not make it. Among the critical points: the company’s willingness to immediately use solid-state batteries (on which Samsung is making significant progress) and the willingness to develop new technologies in the field of artificial intelligence.

The Apple car

Dyson, as mentioned, finds himself in good company, so to speak. Among the other illustrious companies that have failed to make an electric car, we also have Apple. The Californian tech company decided to start the Project Titan in 2014: 1,000 employees and a secret location were ready to give life to the first Apple car ever. Obviously, the car was an all-electric and self-driving one.

The company tried but didn’t make it. From producing an entire car, Apple started to focus only on driving assistance technologies. Then everything stopped. At least for a couple of years, because rumors from Silicon Valley say that Apple is still developing autonomous driving technologies today. But how and with what efforts it is unknown, since there is no official news.

The Google car

Even before Apple, since the early 2000s, Google has ventured into designing an electric and self-driving car. Daughter of the X Lab, the division dedicated to special projects, this small car codenamed Firefly had been presented to the public quite early.

It had rounded lines and hypercompact dimensions. The prototype, which was nicknamed “koala”, certainly managed to bring human beings from one place to another. But calling it a “car” was probably too much.

The project seemed to proceed at a good pace, so much that rumors were stating that Google was already thinking to split the company branch to create an independent company. Sadly, Firefly was eventually abandoned in 2009 and Google decided to change plans, putting aside the whole car project and starting to focus on self-driving technologies only, also in collaboration with FCA.

The Sony Vision-S Concept

Sony has also recently entered the fray, even though it tried to keep a low profile. The consumer electronics giant presented the Vision-S Concept at CES 2020, a concept that introduced many technologies. The Japanese company said that the car will not be marketed, but apart from the official statements, it is known that the car actually works and that has started the set-up tests, thanks to a collaboration with Magna.

While we await for other news, a lot of people already imagine an SUV version of this intriguing Japanese product.

The post Dyson, Apple, Google, Sony: The electric cars that didn’t make it to production appeared first on EVGLOBE - News on Electric Vehicles and Hybrids.

“This is the first one that ran. I drove it secretly in a screened-off compound we have here.” Sir James Dyson told the Sunday Times exclusively as he unveiled for the first time the electric car that was supposed to compete with the American-built Tesla.

The British inventor, and currently the wealthiest man in Britain, had a dream: To build an efficient high-end electric car, possibly better than the Tesla.

That dream broke down last October with the announcement of the definitive abandonment of the project, after having invested £500 million (€580 million, $650 million). The car, however, exists. Sure, there is only a single working prototype, but that’s enough for now. Its “code” name is N526, but for everyone it simply was the “Dyson car.”

It is the first time that Sir Dyson displays his creation in public, at the research center in Wiltshire. It is a large 7-seater electric SUV with an autonomy of over 900 kilometers (560 miles). Dyson published for the first time the image of the only marching prototype, the car that was supposed to compete with Elon Musk’s Tesla.

In 2017, when Dyson provided the first details of the project through an email sent to employees. 400 specialists started to work on the electric car project at the company’s headquarters in Malmesbury, in South-West England. Almost every technician came from the Chinese company Techrules, specialized in turbine battery charging, and from the Californian Faraday, engaged for years in self-driving electric mobility.

In fact, Dyson’s car would most likely have been built in China or Singapore.

“There’s huge sadness and disappointment. Ours is a life of risk and failure. We try things and they fail. Life isn’t easy”

TEST DRIVE: Tesla Model 3 versus BMW i3 electric car

The prototype N526 has the looks of a large 7-seater SUV and it’s quite similar to the Tesla Model X. Dyson has always talked about remarkable performances: acceleration from 0-100 km/h (0-62 mph) in 4.8 seconds and a maximum speed of over 200 km/h (124 mph). The car was going to be all-wheel drive with a power of 536 HP.

Sir Dyson told the journalists how he suddenly decided to cancel the project, after investing years of research and £500 million. During the interview, Dyson talked about the difficulties of achieving economic sustainability, despite the fact that the car should have had a public price of around €150,000.

According to the newspaper, the British company could license solid state batteries (the evolution of current lithium, lighter and more powerful) and other related technologies to mobility to other car manufacturers, in order to reduce the huge money losses the company had to face.

The post James Dyson: Here is what my electric car would have looked like appeared first on EVGLOBE - News on Electric Vehicles and Hybrids.