Karma plans to challenge Tesla and Rivian with an electric pickup truck

Karma Automotive, formerly known as Fisker, is working on its own electric pickup truck to compete with Tesla and Rivian in the electrification of this hugely popular segment in the United States.

Fisker Automotive had a few difficult years since its bankruptcy in 2013. The company’s assets were acquired by the Wanxiang Group, a Chinese auto parts conglomerate, as well as the assets of its battery supplier A123.

Since then, the group has been investing heavily in the company to relaunch the Karma, Fisker’s first vehicle.

It’s a little confusing, but they changed the company’s name to ‘Karma Automotive’ and renamed the Karma ‘Revero‘, and sold around 1,000 units last year.

Karma joins the electric pickup truck fight

The new Karma Revero, a plug-in hybrid, is extremely similar to the original Karma, but the company has been investing in new electric vehicle programs, including fully electric vehicles.

Bloomberg now reports that Karma is working on an electric pickup truck. “Karma plans to base the future pickup on a new all-wheel-drive platform that will enter production at its factory in southern California, according to Kevin Pavlov, who became chief operating officer this month. It will be priced below its gasoline and electric luxury sedan, the Revero, which starts at around 135,000 euros. The architecture will also be used for a high-end sport utility vehicle.”

Importantly, other companies have recently announced plans for electric pickup trucks, including Tesla with the Cybertruck, Rivian with the R1T, Ford with the electric F150, and General Motors is also working on electrifying its trucks.

Pavlov said of the situation that “we can bring a utility vehicle to market and differentiate ourselves.” He also said Karma plans to unveil a concept of its electric pickup truck towards the end of the year. The more, the better. That is especially true in the segment of electric pickup trucks, which we believe will be so large that it will allow a lot of new entrants. Pavlov, who led development of the compact Focus battery-electric car at Ford before working at Magna, is just the latest executive tasked with trying to revive the reincarnation of Fisker. The Chinese auto parts maker Wanxiang Group bought the bankrupt company in 2014 and provided the financial backing to restart the business as Karma, the name of its plug-in sports sedan that was bought by people such as Justin Bieber and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Karma sold around 1,000 units of the Revero last year and launched a higher-performance GT version in November. Pavlov, who oversees business and product strategy, said the company also plans to try to license its electric and autonomous driving technology to other car manufacturers, which may increase stability through the ups and downs of luxury vehicle sales.

That said, we haven’t seen much from Karma that has impressed us so far, especially compared with where they were when they bought Fisker years ago, but we hear they have been working on their core electric technology and we are curious to see what they come up with. Let’s see what they can do.

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