Niche automaker Fisker seems to have secured a bright spot in Detroit’s increasingly bleak automotive landscape. The California-based automaker is opening an engineering center in Pontiac, Michigan, about 30 miles northwest of Detroit, to develop the production version of its Karma plug-in hybrid luxury sedan.
The Karma plug-in hybrid is set to debut at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January.
The Pontiac facility will employ about 200 workers and be measures 34,000 square feet. Automotive News reports that Fisker has just begun moving into the site, which currently employs about 130 workers.
“We’re excited to start something up,” said Henrik Fisker, CEO of Fisker Automotive. “We’re getting a lot of good people in–so that’s obviously a big advantage for us.”
Fisker says that the Karma, which will be assembled in Finland, will be on the market by November 2009. The debut sedan will cost about $87,000 and be capable of driving 50 miles on a single charge, a top speed of 125 miles per hour, as well as 0-60 sprints under six seconds, the automaker says. Company board member and marketing guru Vic Doolan says that the Karma sedan is the first of several such models the automaker is developing.
11/11, 12:52 PM
posted by:
ckron247
Glad to hear they are injecting some new job opportunities for the auto industry into that region. I think it will make a good home for Fisker engineering.
11/11, 2:30 PM
posted by:
yarddog82abn
YOU KNOW THERE’S A NEW PHOTO OF A BLUE TELSA IN EXOTIC WRECKS WEB-SITE….
11/11, 2:59 PM
posted by:
murderedout
GO FISKER! For keeping the auto industry were it belongs, in Michigan! After all,Michigan has the most highly skilled and experienced workforce in the auto industry of any state, and country for that matter.
11/11, 3:25 PM
posted by:
nitinsharma1000
Thats a great move since they will find a lot of skiled layed off workers there. Just stay out of the union crap.
11/11, 4:49 PM
posted by:
beatusmongous
I thought these guys made scissors…
…wait, that’s Fiskars. Sorry.
11/11, 5:01 PM
posted by:
murderedout
nitinsharma1000, how can you call the unions crap, when you can’t even spell skilled right? I’m willing to bet you drive a American car made by the Unions. The newbies on this site are pathetic.
11/11, 5:48 PM
posted by:
Lariat Luxury Locomotive Liner No.3
@nitinsharma1000, unfortunately, Americans—through propaganda—have lumped every human being that carries a union card into the word “union” and slapped a negative connotation on it. This is patently wrong, and if America is to maintain an automobile industry then there are changes to be made within both the unions and the white collar fields. You cannot have the pay/perk disparities of high-paid executives and then start lambasting Americans who are in a union—both need to make critical adjustments, but both should be able to coincide peacefully with one another if America is truly a democracy. And I can state that without equivocation that even the white collar fields are being treated unfairly by upper-management who now have a trough full of euphemisms for screwing employees out of earned benefits.
11/11, 9:18 PM
posted by:
beatusmongous
LLLL#3 is right. Generalizations are generally bad.
11/11, 10:31 PM
posted by:
Lau
All this talk about electric plug in cars gets me thinking….is it really any better for the enviroment? Sure, they don’t use fossil fuels, but where do they get the electricity? I majority of the electricity made in America is made in thermo-electric plants that burn fossil fuels anyways….so, yeah. /rant off
11/12, 2:53 PM
posted by:
t-ak-box
@ Lariat Luxury locomotive Liner #3
No truer words have been said.