Congrats Aptera! I have a controversial point of view about Aptera that I want to give my two cents here. All comments are welcome. First off, I am a huge fan of Aptera Motors Corp. and Chris Anthony! If Chris and Steve were not kick out of Aptera Motors Inc. by their investors (IdeaLab) chasing a quick buck years ago, I strongly believe that Aptera Motors today could have been as big as Tesla Inc.! Chris is one of the nicest people that I have gotten to talk to. He takes his time to answer all my questions about Aptera so that I am not in the dark anymore. Chris is one of the smartest people that I know of. I would consider Chris to be on the same intelligence level as Elon Musk in the EV Industry minus the deep pockets of Elon Musk. With that being said, I do not really think it is a good idea for Aptera Motors Corp. to be taking VC Money at this time. I say this because it is so easy for a VC Firm to be much more interested in making a quick buck off of a good idea instead of helping it to reach its full potential. Once a business takes VC Funding, the company founders are now just employees of that VC Firm. At the end of the day, what that VC Firm says matters a lot more than what the founders think because the VC Firm is now the owner of the company and not the company founders anymore. All it takes is just one disagreement with a VC Firm on a business issue, then Chris and Steve are kicked back to the curb again just to see Aptera Motors Corp. ran straight back into the ground once again! I do not want to see a Repeat of Aptera Team B lead by Paul Wilbur happen ever again! There are tons of people (myself included) that are huge fans of Aptera! Most of us here are not rich at all. We are mostly Middle Class Folk. For example, I am currently a 3rd Shift Grocery Stocker at my Local Grocery Store. Unfortunately, I am NOT in a financial position to invest a Few Million Dollars (USD) in Aptera Motors Corp. to help them reach their goals. However, I did invested $100 (USD) in Aptera Motors Corp. already. I might invest some more money later on. Over $400,000 (USD) has already been invested in Aptera Motors Corp. by people just like you and me online. Here is my idea. Aptera Motors Corp. sets up and runs a few different pages on the Aptera Website where VCs, Suppliers, Press, Customers, Job Seekers and Etc. can sign up their interest in doing business with Aptera Motors Corp. down the road. So Aptera Motors Corp. will have access to those resources if they need help to get bail out of a situation that Chris and Steve cannot handle on their own. I am just a regular Middle Class Person. I just need a vehicle to get me around town (Job, Store, Church, Park and Etc.) It does not need to be fancy at all! It just has to be affordable, easily fixable and easy to operate thou. Chris and Steve should try anything and everything (legal and moral of course) to help reduce Aptera's Burn Rate of Cash as much as possible. I am talking about running a shoestring business here for the foreseeable future. So that $400,000 (USD) they have raised online can last Aptera Motors Corp. two to three years at least. Aptera Motors Corp. could design and build its first EV to be an All Electric Aptera MK-O as a kit car. Let's say the first Aptera Customers have to put down 100% down payment to buy an All Electric Aptera MK-O. Then customers with a smaller down payments would then be able to purchase an Electric Aptera MK-O at a later date. Once a Customer has put down his/her down payment in the Aptera Escrow Bank Account online, his/her name would be put onto a waiting list. When their name comes up on the waiting list, he/she would get an email and a phone call from Aptera Motors Corp. helping him/her set up his/her trip to San Diego, CA. for a week or two. For that week, that customer would get hands on help from Chris, Steve and the rest of the team there to basically build their All Electric Aptera MK-O from scratch. Then that customer could drive around Southern California for a few days. Aptera Motors Corp. would then help that customer to pack up and ship their hand made All Electric Aptera MK-O back home by Semi or Train or Cargo Ship. (BMW already offers a Factory Tour plus delivery help for its customers on vacation in Europe.) Aptera Motors Corp. could be established in a small garage/office building in a office park somewhere in SoCal to help keep costs as low as possible as they did beforehand back in 2006. Once enough profits have been raised thru All Electric Aptera MK-O Sales, Aptera Motors Corp. pays off every single investor and creditor as soon as possible. Aptera Motors Corp. gives an extra 30% Interest to help make its investors and creditors happy. I am not going to lie. It will take at least a few years (Maybe 5 years to 10 years) to be able to earn enough profits ($50 Million - $100 Million Dollars) to basically self fund the design, production and servicing of the Aptera 2e Production Model. It might seem that I am trying to slow things down quite a bit for Aptera Motors Corp. I can even heard a ton of people here saying that Aptera Motors Corp. needs to go big quickly to be able to have a chance to compete with all the EVs that will soon be coming to market. Aptera's Team B CEO Paul Wilbur already tried that and see what happen to Aptera Motors Inc. already. I do not believe in living in the past at all. We need to live our lives here in the present. However, we should try to learn from our mistakes or we are bound to repeat them. Steve Fambro's Flickr Account https://www.flickr.com/photos/24602659@N04/albums Sorry for the long read folks. I have been thinking about this Aptera Issue for over Ten years now. I hope you all have a great day! Thanks again! Nathan.
MK-0 Hand assembled car is an interesting idea. You’ve seen the robotized (Automated) gigafactory? That’s where we need to go. Think big!! We need to displace 5% of all cars... that should be the goal in terms of gearing up... millions. Then, expand to localized production hubs in regions of the world.
Theres XYZ Cargo bike (search) that does a similar ‘buy or build model you might check out.. could be an offering, but we want to Scale Up for ICE car displacement ASAP!
I see you are a fan of Tesla Inc. as well. You owned a nice Grey Tesla Model 3. I watched your YouTube Video online. I started to invest in Tesla Inc. back in 2012 at $36 a share. Unfortunately, my parents were scared that Tesla Inc. would go bankrupt just like General Motors did back in 2008. So I bought only two Tesla Inc. shares at $72.00 total. I just wish that I did not listen to them at all and invest a lot more money into Tesla Inc. back in 2012. I would than have a lot more money to invest in Aptera Motors Corp. than just $100. I have been following Aptera Motors Corp. and Tesla Inc. for over Ten Years now. Elon Musk is the Brains behind Tesla Inc. Chris Anthony and Steve Fambro are the Brains behind Aptera Motors Corp. So what is the main difference here between Elon Musk and Chris Anthony/Steve Fambro? About $34.4 Billion Dollars (USD) give or take. That is the current net worth of Elon Musk as of 2020. I am guessing that Chris and Steve have way less money than Elon Musk. Just a guess there. Chris and Steve have already tried to "Go Big or Go Home!" once before. They were able to raise over $40 Million Dollars (USD) from Outside Investors (Venture Capitalists). It seem that everything was going great at the time. Aptera Motors Inc. was almost ready to delivery it's first Aptera 2e to customers! Then Aptera's Main Investor IdeaLab wanted to make a quick buck fast. (Look up the Pets.com Story for further explanation as well please.) IdeaLab kick out Chris and Steve. IdeaLab brought in Aptera Team B from Detroit. They literally have criminal rap sheets for stealing from investors back in Detroit. Aptera Team B CEO Paul Wilbur basically made a ton of promises that they could not keep but the investors wanted to hear anyways. Paul Wilbur talked about how Aptera 2e had to be completely redesigned to make it more mainstream for customers while literally waiting for a United States Department of Energy Loan than never came while Aptera was in business. I literally took it upon myself to try to help save Aptera from bankruptcy in a last ditch effort. I somehow got in contact with the then CEO of Cessna Airplanes in Kansas. I told him my idea of establishing a business partnership between Cessna and Aptera. At the time, Cessna did not have a lot of customers buying new airplanes because most of the rich people money was gone by then due to the 2008 Financial Crisis. So most of the Cessna Factories were mothballed and Cessna's workers were laid off. Next thing I know, I am getting a call from IdeaLab Lawyer. He told me that I needed to knock it off. That I was misrepresented myself as an Aptera worker. I told him that I never did call myself an Aptera employee at all. I am just a fan of Aptera. No more or no less. I told him that Aptera was never going to get their hands on that sweet government loan because the government works way too slowly and Aptera was burning cash like there was no tomorrow. He told me that I did not know what I was talking about. They trusted Paul Wilbur. He knew how to run a car company IdeLab said. After Aptera went bankrupt, I called IdeaLab. I was told they wash their hands of Aptera because Aptera was unable to find new investors. That is a bunch of BS. Cessna was ready and willing to start writing the checks immediately to get Cessna Factories and Workers back to work! IdeaLab just did not want a major international investor such as Cessna Airplanes to invest and dilute their equity stake in Aptera. Idealab ended up losing over $20 Million Dollars (USD) in the Aptera Investment. Other Aptera Investors lost Million of Dollars as well. I am amazed that Aptera Investors did not sued IdeaLab for destroying their investments in Aptera. So Go Big or Go Home does not really seem to work at all when you (the founder) are not even in the driver seat of your own company anymore. You just become another clog in the machine. In this case, I just wish Chris and Steve could just learn from history so they do not repeat the same mistakes that they made in the past. Aptera is NOT Tesla Inc. That ship has sailed long ago. It is now time to get Aptera into a position where they have a ton of profit on their books with as little debt/outside investors as possible. So down the road, Tesla Inc. or another auto manufacturer might want to acquire Aptera in a stock transaction. Good Ideas are a dime a dozen. The execution of that idea into fruition is the really hard part. Thanks for your time. Nathan. Good video by the way. Discussions with Philip Huerter and Tesla Model 3 owners at Celebrate West Hartford June 1 2019 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wssh97PyjP4
Awesome news!
Congrats Aptera! I have a controversial point of view about Aptera that I want to give my two cents here. All comments are welcome. First off, I am a huge fan of Aptera Motors Corp. and Chris Anthony! If Chris and Steve were not kick out of Aptera Motors Inc. by their investors (IdeaLab) chasing a quick buck years ago, I strongly believe that Aptera Motors today could have been as big as Tesla Inc.! Chris is one of the nicest people that I have gotten to talk to. He takes his time to answer all my questions about Aptera so that I am not in the dark anymore. Chris is one of the smartest people that I know of. I would consider Chris to be on the same intelligence level as Elon Musk in the EV Industry minus the deep pockets of Elon Musk. With that being said, I do not really think it is a good idea for Aptera Motors Corp. to be taking VC Money at this time. I say this because it is so easy for a VC Firm to be much more interested in making a quick buck off of a good idea instead of helping it to reach its full potential. Once a business takes VC Funding, the company founders are now just employees of that VC Firm. At the end of the day, what that VC Firm says matters a lot more than what the founders think because the VC Firm is now the owner of the company and not the company founders anymore. All it takes is just one disagreement with a VC Firm on a business issue, then Chris and Steve are kicked back to the curb again just to see Aptera Motors Corp. ran straight back into the ground once again! I do not want to see a Repeat of Aptera Team B lead by Paul Wilbur happen ever again! There are tons of people (myself included) that are huge fans of Aptera! Most of us here are not rich at all. We are mostly Middle Class Folk. For example, I am currently a 3rd Shift Grocery Stocker at my Local Grocery Store. Unfortunately, I am NOT in a financial position to invest a Few Million Dollars (USD) in Aptera Motors Corp. to help them reach their goals. However, I did invested $100 (USD) in Aptera Motors Corp. already. I might invest some more money later on. Over $400,000 (USD) has already been invested in Aptera Motors Corp. by people just like you and me online. Here is my idea. Aptera Motors Corp. sets up and runs a few different pages on the Aptera Website where VCs, Suppliers, Press, Customers, Job Seekers and Etc. can sign up their interest in doing business with Aptera Motors Corp. down the road. So Aptera Motors Corp. will have access to those resources if they need help to get bail out of a situation that Chris and Steve cannot handle on their own. I am just a regular Middle Class Person. I just need a vehicle to get me around town (Job, Store, Church, Park and Etc.) It does not need to be fancy at all! It just has to be affordable, easily fixable and easy to operate thou. Chris and Steve should try anything and everything (legal and moral of course) to help reduce Aptera's Burn Rate of Cash as much as possible. I am talking about running a shoestring business here for the foreseeable future. So that $400,000 (USD) they have raised online can last Aptera Motors Corp. two to three years at least. Aptera Motors Corp. could design and build its first EV to be an All Electric Aptera MK-O as a kit car. Let's say the first Aptera Customers have to put down 100% down payment to buy an All Electric Aptera MK-O. Then customers with a smaller down payments would then be able to purchase an Electric Aptera MK-O at a later date. Once a Customer has put down his/her down payment in the Aptera Escrow Bank Account online, his/her name would be put onto a waiting list. When their name comes up on the waiting list, he/she would get an email and a phone call from Aptera Motors Corp. helping him/her set up his/her trip to San Diego, CA. for a week or two. For that week, that customer would get hands on help from Chris, Steve and the rest of the team there to basically build their All Electric Aptera MK-O from scratch. Then that customer could drive around Southern California for a few days. Aptera Motors Corp. would then help that customer to pack up and ship their hand made All Electric Aptera MK-O back home by Semi or Train or Cargo Ship. (BMW already offers a Factory Tour plus delivery help for its customers on vacation in Europe.) Aptera Motors Corp. could be established in a small garage/office building in a office park somewhere in SoCal to help keep costs as low as possible as they did beforehand back in 2006. Once enough profits have been raised thru All Electric Aptera MK-O Sales, Aptera Motors Corp. pays off every single investor and creditor as soon as possible. Aptera Motors Corp. gives an extra 30% Interest to help make its investors and creditors happy. I am not going to lie. It will take at least a few years (Maybe 5 years to 10 years) to be able to earn enough profits ($50 Million - $100 Million Dollars) to basically self fund the design, production and servicing of the Aptera 2e Production Model. It might seem that I am trying to slow things down quite a bit for Aptera Motors Corp. I can even heard a ton of people here saying that Aptera Motors Corp. needs to go big quickly to be able to have a chance to compete with all the EVs that will soon be coming to market. Aptera's Team B CEO Paul Wilbur already tried that and see what happen to Aptera Motors Inc. already. I do not believe in living in the past at all. We need to live our lives here in the present. However, we should try to learn from our mistakes or we are bound to repeat them. Steve Fambro's Flickr Account https://www.flickr.com/photos/24602659@N04/albums Sorry for the long read folks. I have been thinking about this Aptera Issue for over Ten years now. I hope you all have a great day! Thanks again! Nathan.
I would be all over this plan. Idea of a hands on my build would be
I think people would like the chance to own something that they build with their own two hands instead of just buying it straight from a factory.
MK-0 Hand assembled car is an interesting idea. You’ve seen the robotized (Automated) gigafactory? That’s where we need to go. Think big!! We need to displace 5% of all cars... that should be the goal in terms of gearing up... millions. Then, expand to localized production hubs in regions of the world.
Theres XYZ Cargo bike (search) that does a similar ‘buy or build model you might check out.. could be an offering, but we want to Scale Up for ICE car displacement ASAP!
Nice to meet you Nathan.
-Phil Huerter
Hi Philip,
I see you are a fan of Tesla Inc. as well. You owned a nice Grey Tesla Model 3. I watched your YouTube Video online. I started to invest in Tesla Inc. back in 2012 at $36 a share. Unfortunately, my parents were scared that Tesla Inc. would go bankrupt just like General Motors did back in 2008. So I bought only two Tesla Inc. shares at $72.00 total. I just wish that I did not listen to them at all and invest a lot more money into Tesla Inc. back in 2012. I would than have a lot more money to invest in Aptera Motors Corp. than just $100. I have been following Aptera Motors Corp. and Tesla Inc. for over Ten Years now. Elon Musk is the Brains behind Tesla Inc. Chris Anthony and Steve Fambro are the Brains behind Aptera Motors Corp. So what is the main difference here between Elon Musk and Chris Anthony/Steve Fambro? About $34.4 Billion Dollars (USD) give or take. That is the current net worth of Elon Musk as of 2020. I am guessing that Chris and Steve have way less money than Elon Musk. Just a guess there. Chris and Steve have already tried to "Go Big or Go Home!" once before. They were able to raise over $40 Million Dollars (USD) from Outside Investors (Venture Capitalists). It seem that everything was going great at the time. Aptera Motors Inc. was almost ready to delivery it's first Aptera 2e to customers! Then Aptera's Main Investor IdeaLab wanted to make a quick buck fast. (Look up the Pets.com Story for further explanation as well please.) IdeaLab kick out Chris and Steve. IdeaLab brought in Aptera Team B from Detroit. They literally have criminal rap sheets for stealing from investors back in Detroit. Aptera Team B CEO Paul Wilbur basically made a ton of promises that they could not keep but the investors wanted to hear anyways. Paul Wilbur talked about how Aptera 2e had to be completely redesigned to make it more mainstream for customers while literally waiting for a United States Department of Energy Loan than never came while Aptera was in business. I literally took it upon myself to try to help save Aptera from bankruptcy in a last ditch effort. I somehow got in contact with the then CEO of Cessna Airplanes in Kansas. I told him my idea of establishing a business partnership between Cessna and Aptera. At the time, Cessna did not have a lot of customers buying new airplanes because most of the rich people money was gone by then due to the 2008 Financial Crisis. So most of the Cessna Factories were mothballed and Cessna's workers were laid off. Next thing I know, I am getting a call from IdeaLab Lawyer. He told me that I needed to knock it off. That I was misrepresented myself as an Aptera worker. I told him that I never did call myself an Aptera employee at all. I am just a fan of Aptera. No more or no less. I told him that Aptera was never going to get their hands on that sweet government loan because the government works way too slowly and Aptera was burning cash like there was no tomorrow. He told me that I did not know what I was talking about. They trusted Paul Wilbur. He knew how to run a car company IdeLab said. After Aptera went bankrupt, I called IdeaLab. I was told they wash their hands of Aptera because Aptera was unable to find new investors. That is a bunch of BS. Cessna was ready and willing to start writing the checks immediately to get Cessna Factories and Workers back to work! IdeaLab just did not want a major international investor such as Cessna Airplanes to invest and dilute their equity stake in Aptera. Idealab ended up losing over $20 Million Dollars (USD) in the Aptera Investment. Other Aptera Investors lost Million of Dollars as well. I am amazed that Aptera Investors did not sued IdeaLab for destroying their investments in Aptera. So Go Big or Go Home does not really seem to work at all when you (the founder) are not even in the driver seat of your own company anymore. You just become another clog in the machine. In this case, I just wish Chris and Steve could just learn from history so they do not repeat the same mistakes that they made in the past. Aptera is NOT Tesla Inc. That ship has sailed long ago. It is now time to get Aptera into a position where they have a ton of profit on their books with as little debt/outside investors as possible. So down the road, Tesla Inc. or another auto manufacturer might want to acquire Aptera in a stock transaction. Good Ideas are a dime a dozen. The execution of that idea into fruition is the really hard part. Thanks for your time. Nathan. Good video by the way. Discussions with Philip Huerter and Tesla Model 3 owners at Celebrate West Hartford June 1 2019 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wssh97PyjP4