Dyson building an Electric Car

[1208]

He wants to hoover up the competition.

Here's everything we know about Dyson's electric car

Dyson sucks up government funding for electric car - FT.com

Dyson IS working on an electric car, government report reveals

 

[MSEV]

Interesting, thank you for posting.
I always find it interesting when a company says how they are going to have batteries that are so much better than what we have today in a short period of time.
I trust most what Elon said, something like, show me.
So I hope Dyson can make such great batteries, but I will wait and see.

 

[CHG-ON]

Vacuum cleaner...car. Yup. They are the same. One sucks dirt. One sucks your eyes into the back of your head.

 

[Vexar]

Interesting, thank you for posting.
I always find it interesting when a company says how they are going to have batteries that are so much better than what we have today in a short period of time.
I trust most what Elon said, something like, show me.
So I hope Dyson can make such great batteries, but I will wait and see.

They bought Sakti3 :
Dyson acquires Sakti3 for $90M to help commercialize ‘breakthrough’ solid-state battery tech
And Sakti3 has been at it for a while, but still nothing more than investor fluff articles. According to Quartz, Ms. Sastry won't publish her findings, and failed evaluation on a medical device prototype some years ago, using a lithographic-printed lithium electrolyte instead of a gel.

From a publicity perspective, I see lots of positives in Ms. Sastry, but along with the rest of the world, I don't see results. I think Dyson bought them for power research. Their contact is [email protected], suggesting they are US-based Power Research. My guess is they will do pack design for whatever Dyson is building, and keep a percentage focused on the blue sky.

 

[Sunlight]

Well here is a prototype - vacuum cleaner meets car!

Brabham BT46B - raced once - won - banned.............

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Dyson makes products with high-speed electric motors, and would expect to make some more of them with batteries in the future.
We don't know what kind of electric car they want to make, but it makes sense to me for them to look at electric cars. It's not necessarily that they'd actually want to make electric cars, but that they would want to do development in the drivetrain.

 

[jerry33]

If their cars aren't going to be any better than their vacuums, I'd stay well away. Had a couple of their vacuums, neither lasted more than a couple of months.

 

[gregd]

The problem is that the heart of an electric car, at least the good ones, is in the electronics and the software. Dyson has neither in their kit of core competencies. A deep cycle battery and some jumper cables does not a modern electric car make.

 

[webbrowan]

It is all about developing new products in order to progress forward within the industry. Providing a variety of merchandises simply opens up doors of opportunity for the company in their efforts to thrive alongside other tough competitors.

 

[Skotty]

Why would Dyson want to get into the EV monopoly game now when Tesla already owns Boardwalk and Park Place? Any new non-automotive company that wants to jump on the electric vehicle bandwagon now should probably consider something other than automobiles. Like maybe lawn mowers and tractors. That market is ripe for a real EV player. Current electric offerings for lawn equipment are as feeble as EVs were before Tesla came along.

I'd pay big bucks for a quality li-ion lawn tractor. Best out there right now is probably the mean green company, and quite frankly, they don't impress.

 

[paulkva]

Why would Dyson want to get into the EV monopoly game now when Tesla already owns Boardwalk and Park Place? Any new non-automotive company that wants to jump on the electric vehicle bandwagon now should probably consider something other than automobiles. Like maybe lawn mowers and tractors. That market is ripe for a real EV player. Current electric offerings for lawn equipment are as feeble as EVs were before Tesla came along.

I'd pay big bucks for a quality li-ion lawn tractor. Best out there right now is probably the mean green company, and quite frankly, they don't impress.

I think you almost answered your own question. As great as Tesla is, they only currently offer a couple classes of automobiles for sale. I don't know what Dyson is planning, but they could certainly gain EV market share without competing as directly against Tesla, by offering something Tesla doesn't have in its announced short-to-medium-term plans, e.g. (in no particular order) pickup trucks, minivans, larger/commercial trucks or vans, subcompacts, coupes, wagons, etc. Or, to your point, lawn mowers or tractors.

That certainly doesn't make it all that much easier on Dyson, of course. To be successful on a large scale with EVs, they'll still have to come up with a high-range, mid-priced vehicle, and I'd be quite surprised if they can do so in less than 3-5 years.

 

[voyager]

Great... an EV that sucks...
;-)

Btw, Chaparral once had an endurance racer that sucked the air underneath to create downforce.

 

[larmor]

Can it be returned to costco if it doesn't work, years after purchase?

 

[TE3LA]

Interesting, thank you for posting.
I always find it interesting when a company says how they are going to have batteries that are so much better than what we have today in a short period of time.
I trust most what Elon said, something like, show me.
So I hope Dyson can make such great batteries, but I will wait and see.

Here is a great article about Sakti3's tech. It sounds like there are good reasons to be skeptical:

Sakti3’s quest for a better battery: Hype, funding, promises, and then a surprise sale

 

[TEG]

The driving experience 'sucks'...

But you can flip it in reverse and 'blow the doors off' everything around you.

 

[aesculus]

I hope it's a hovercraft.

 

[pchilds]

It will cost 5 times what the model S costs and won't work.

 

[gene]

I imagine there will be more and more folks deciding to go into the EV business. Some may end up being successful.

Tesla’s former head of comms joins Dyson as company is quietly going into electric car business

 

[sandpiper]

This is like the tech boom of the late 90s. Everybody and their dog figures that they can build an electric car. And I expect that it's going to end every bit as well for the vast majority of them,

 

[green1]

This is like the tech boom of the late 90s. Everybody and their dog figures that they can build an electric car. And I expect that it's going to end every bit as well for the vast majority of them,

The vast majority won't succeed, but if even one or two do succeed we all win.