Faraday Future receives £1.5 billion investment ahead of FF 91 production

Electric car company Faraday Future looks on course to launch its first model later this year after it received £1.5 billion (Rs 13,567 crore) worth of investment from a Hong Kong holding company.

The money, supplied by Evergrande Health, adds to the £750 million (6,787 crore) Faraday Future raised last year by selling off shares. The cash injection means plans to put the FF 91 electric SUV (above), a future rival to the Tesla Model S, into production can go forward. Faraday Future CEO Jia Yueting has said this will take place later this year. 

The FF 91 is powered by a 130kWh battery and uses Faraday Future's patented Echelon Inverter, which the company claims can transform more energy while using less space than existing inverters.

The car is claimed to be capable of gaining 500 miles (804.6 km) worth of charge per hour and comes with a home charger that can fill the battery to 50 percent in less than 4.5 hours at 240V. Faraday Future predicts the car will offer a range of more than 435 miles on the New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) test.

The FF 91 will first be launched in China and the US, with production for each market handled within each country. Faraday Future is set to open facilities in Hanford, California and Nansha, Guangzhou. The former is an existing plant that is being refurbished. It replaces plans for an all-new site in Nevada, Texas, which took a hit when construction contractor AECOM claimed a payment of $21m (Rs 144 crore) was late.

Securing investment has turned Faraday Future off the worrying path it was on last year. The firm lost several high-level executives in close succession, casting doubt on its future. Former chief financial officer Stefan Krause resigned in October and chief technology officer Ulrich Kranz’s contract was terminated.

Faraday Future said that these changes had no impact upon its ongoing research and development process. It also showed no signs of slowing demand for its FF 91, which has already received more than 64,000 orders.