APTERA
THE 2e FROM APTERA
A 200 MPG-PLUS SOLUTION FOR THE ‘GREEN ECONOMY’…
By Brian Terhorst
We saw them, the rumors are true. They are real, and man, are they cool! As we pulled into the Aptera headquarters, the latest prototype pulled out of the driveway directly in front of us. Looking something like an airplane fuselage on wheels or a prop from the movie i-Robot, the silent vehicle accelerated away from us at a respectably fast clip. They had a few people worrying about their deposits they had coughed up, when they were a no show at the latest Car show in San Diego. But we can guarantee that they are being built in limited numbers up in North County. The Southern California Company is On-Target to Manufacture 100,000 ‘Ultra-Efficient’ Electric, Hybrid and Gas Vehicles and Employ 1,500 by 2014
Green news is everywhere. President Obama is contemplating a $100 billion “green stimulus” package. Multinational corporations are very publicly slashing their use of fossil fuels. And, of course, the American auto industry has slogged up to Capitol Hill seeking funds to help build more fuel-efficient vehicles.
All the while, there’s a small auto manufacturing enterprise in the San Diego suburbs that, by October 2009, will be marketing affordable, all-electric vehicles that get the equivalent of more than 200 miles per-gallon. Talk about putting some green back in the pockets of consumers. The company, Aptera (Greek for “wingless flight”), was co-founded in 2006 by entrepreneurs Steve Fambro and Chris Anthony. The concept originated when Fambro, an engineer working in the biotech industry, was sitting in typical Southern California traffic daydreaming about designing and building a passenger vehicle to battle the stops and starts of his daily commute. And since it was only a dream, let’s make it a safe, comfortable and more fuel-efficient than anything ever produced.
“I started with aerodynamics and let the vehicle design itself,” says Fambro. “Everybody else conceives a design and then attempts to squeeze the most function from there.”
Sounds simple enough, but since the arrival of the automobile more than 110 years ago, the best and brightest minds – from Thomas Edison to international conglomerates – have strived to build and market mainstream electric vehicles. To date, for a wide array of complex reasons, all have failed. Undeterred by history and spurred by the iconoclastic notion of manufacturing American-made vehicles somewhere other than in Detroit, Fambro began experimenting. What started in his garage a few years ago, with the approval of his very understanding wife Tricia, has become a company with nearly 100 employees, three rounds of investor funding and is now producing an all-electric vehicle that will hit the market in late 2009. Known as the 2e, the two-seat electric vehicle carries the promise of getting the estimated equivalent of approximately 200 miles per gallon. So, too, do the hybrid and gas models that are on the Aptera drawing board.
“I’m not overstating when I say we’re in the process of manufacturing an aerodynamic marvel,” says Aptera CEO Paul Wilbur, the former president and CEO of American Specialty Cars, who also has more than 25 years of product planning, marketing and development for Ford, Chrysler and other auto manufacturers. “The Aptera is almost three times more aerodynamic than a Prius and is actually more aerodynamic than a Formula One race car and even a bicycle racer. Combine all this with its lightweight composite design and you’re looking at the most energy efficient vehicle in the world.”
The Aptera’s been compared to everything from an airplane (after all, it does feature composite aircraft construction) to a vehicle that gets “extra points for cool design and acceleration from zero to 60 in under 10 seconds,” according to Time magazine. One thing’s for certain, the low drag, uniquely shaped three-wheeler (yes, three wheels are most efficient) is being developed by some of the sharpest minds the U.S. auto industry.
CEO Wilbur, who joined Aptera in August, was tasked by Fambro and Anthony with assembling an allstar cast. Vista, California, with its year-round balmy climate and easy access to miles of beaches proved to be an allure. So did the challenge of being part of a project that, according to Aptera chief engineer Tom Reichenbach, can conceivably redefine the automotive marketplace. “I’ve always been an efficiency nut and was looking to be involved in green technologies, so Aptera was a perfect fit,” said Reichenbach, who spent 26 years at Ford, where he developed on-board electronic systems for Ford Racing and the first fuel injection system on an Indy car. “We use too much energy as a nation and we have to change. Since Detroit has been slow to react, I finally made the move to Southern California. Now I’ve got the challenge of a lifetime with Aptera and I’ve got the bonus of living where the culture, people and weather are fantastic.” The list of other former Detroiters who’ve recently joined the Aptera team includes top-level engineers, designers, marketing execs and upper management types with lengthy backgrounds in design and development for General Motors, Ford and others. Despite all their prior automotive successes, can Fambro and his band of Michigan refugees really succeed where so many others have repeatedly failed?
There are nearly 4,000 depositors who’ve plunked down $500 to reserve an Aptera once they go into production that are betting they can. Additionally, the vehicle has already graced the cover of Popular Mechanics, is among the finalists for the coveted Automotive X-Prize and was named by Time magazine among its “Best Inventions of 2008”. Set to hit the market in fourth quarter 2009, Wilbur says his corporate blueprint calls for Aptera to grow exponentially, creating some 1,500 jobs and more than 100,000 vehicles by 2014, including the all electric, a hybrid and several others the team has yet to divulge. At the outset, the Aptera will only be sold in California, with plans to slowly rollout across the U.S. by 2011, and while the ultimate pricing has not yet been released, Wilbur estimates the vehicle MSRP will range from the mid-$20,000s to the mid- $40,000s depending on power train and options. “We’re confident Aptera can be a standard-bearer for the Obama green economy,” says Wilbur. “Great mileage, remarkable efficiency, innovative technology and it’s priced to fit within many family budgets.”
