Fisker Plans To Use Volkswagen’s MEB Platform To Underpin Its Ocean SUV

• The Fisker Ocean Concept is built on VW’s MEB platform.

• On Monday, Fisker announced its merger with Spartan Energy Acquisition Corp.

• The Fisker Ocean SUV prototype was built by Volkswagen subsidiary Italdesign.

At one point in Fisker’s corporate life, the product was a luxury sedan, the batteries were solid-state but now, it’s clear that they went shopping at Volkswagen for almost everything we don’t see. Yes, the Fisker Ocean concept is built on VW’s MEB electric vehicle platform.

EV start-ups are melting investors’ minds – everyone wants a piece of the action. Be it Karma, Tesla, Nikola, and so on, there’s no end in sight to how much money some are willing to throw their way. With the exception of Tesla, none of the others have built a single production vehicle so far. And Fisker’s still a solid two years away from doing so.

Yesterday’s announcement put Fisker on the road to production. But, according to The Verge and to the investor presentation, the painted picture is one of Volkswagen supplying the platform and Fisker building a “bespoke” body and cabin onto it, much like Ford will do for commercial vehicles. The presentation alludes to “various vehicles” produced, all of which are to be assembled on VW’s MEB.

Thing is that Volkswagen will use its proprietary technology and introduce its own vehicles, which are likely to be less expensive. And then, there’s Audi that is on the same “plan”. It is true that calling upon VW’s platform will reduce both costs and development times but we have to wonder how many customers will actually consider a Fisker. Although it will be priced from $37,499, by the time it comes out, it will face stiff competition from the Tesla Model Y, Mercedes-Benz EQC, Ford Mustang Mach-E, to name only three established brands and products.

“Volkswagen is still open to support small series projects that demonstrate the variety of conceivable concepts based on the MEB platform through their emotional appearance,” a spokesperson for Volkswagen said in an email to The Verge. “In consultation with Volkswagen, the Audi subsidiary Italdesign has now used the MEB platform as the basis for the development of the Fisker Ocean SUV. However, a final decision has not yet been made about a possible cooperation with Fisker to implement a series project.”

At this point, there’s plenty of room for all the start-ups however once the established carmakers flood the market with numerous EVs, unless you’ve created a niche or introduced a product that the market wants, like Rivian for example, the going will get tough we think.

This is an interesting developing story and we’ll keep on it.