In the era of intelligent networking, what will be the future of Jia Yueting's Faraday Future?

In the year after LeTV was delisted, Faraday Future FF was successfully listed on the other side of the ocean, which has been the focus of almost all media attention in the past two days. "Jia Busi" has returned to the spotlight, making this "Internet celebrity" who has gradually faded from our sight once again focus on global attention. Jia Yueting's LeTV has had too many bright moments in China, and has also fallen to the bottom. Even in the most difficult times, Jia Yueting was unwilling to give up control of FF. Now that FF has been successfully listed and FF91 is about to be mass-produced, whether Jia Yueting can fight back and usher in a major turning point in his life has become a topic of great discussion.

1. There were already signs that FF would go public

In fact, FF has shown many signs of improvement since the end of last year. Not only did Geely invest in FF, but the joint venture between Geely and Foxconn produced FF91 in China. There were also rumors that the Zhuhai Municipal Government was deeply involved in FF's investment and sought to locate the FF91 factory in Zhuhai. After Jia Yueting stepped down as CEO and focused on the position of product manager, and FF introduced BMW veteran and Byton founder Carsten Breitfeld, FF began to gradually show signs of entering a virtuous cycle.

Judging from the FF91 model alone, even at present, if many of its design indicators can be achieved, it will still be highly competitive. This includes: a range of 608km under more stringent EPA conditions and a supercar level of 2.4s per 100 kilometers. Looking at the domestic and even global electric vehicle market, there are only a handful of models with such performance. As for other configurations, FF91 is also not behind. You know, this model was unveiled as early as 2017/2018. If it could be promoted to mass production at that time, it would definitely be the strongest opponent of Model S. But there is no if in this world, and FF has missed the perfect opportunity for development. Now looking around, the entire market has long been a red ocean market. To gain a foothold in this market, both FF91 and FF face self-evident challenges.

2. Can the mass production of FF91 become Jia Yueting’s bargaining chip for a comeback?

But even if FF91 can really be successfully mass-produced within 12 months, for FF or Jia Yueting himself, it is nothing more than the first step of a long march. The successful listing on Nasdaq is the best reward for Jia Yueting's persistence in the past period of time, or a certain degree of affirmation, but for a car company, achieving self-sustaining blood is the key to its sustainable development. But judging from the current situation of FF, it is still very far from achieving self-sustaining blood. Not to mention that in the past two or three years, FF has not had enough resources to invest in the development of new models and forward-looking technologies. During this time, many companies, including Tesla, FF's former biggest competitor, have made relatively large breakthroughs in underlying core technologies. They optimized their systems by collecting a large amount of data, leaving FF far behind.

Putting aside the fact that the FF91 is priced high and is not a high-volume model. Even if the FF81 is launched later, with Jia Yueting's current personal reputation, there is a big question mark as to how many consumers will choose FF's products. At the FF's launch ceremony, Jia Yueting locked FF's competitors on super luxury brands such as Bentley, Maybach and Ferrari. Although these super luxury brands have strong brand appeal, their accumulation in the three-electric system and intelligent network connection technology is actually not sufficient. So, compared with these brands, FF does have advantages in the three-electric system. But not to mention compared with new and old forces and technology giants such as Tesla, Google, Volkswagen, and Baidu, even compared with domestic rising stars such as Weilai, Xiaopeng, and Ideal, FF is not sure of winning.

3. The automotive industry has entered an era of fierce competition, and no automaker or tech giant involved is sure of success. FF only received $1 billion in funding from this IPO, which is not enough to support the mass production of FF91, not to mention the development of FF81 and other underlying core technologies related to intelligent networking.

The capital market is actually a place of fighting. For the US market, Tesla in 2020 has left too many people with too much room for imagination. Electric car companies in the market have become a scarce resource. Moreover, FF has been promoting its large number of patents, including the three-electric system, which has become the biggest weight for it to sell the company's prospects to investors in this listing.

But the capital market is also a cruel place. If FF91 fails to achieve the performance that investors expect in the future, the market will inevitably abandon it ruthlessly. Time is running out for Jia Yueting!