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This Dyson car idea always did sound weird. I like his reasons for trying. But its very hard to make a decent AND affordable electric car. I have no doubt Dyson

This Dyson car idea always did sound weird. I like his reasons for trying. But its very hard to make a decent AND affordable electric car. I have no doubt Dyson could have made a decent one, but to make it affordable they would have needed huge economies of scale, or huge risk-taking balls a la Tesla. And as the article said, there was no point betting their stable existing business on a new moon shot. Maybe 15 or 20 years ago, before Tesla had kicked the electric car segment up the arse, and the options around were all still pretty crappy, then an expensive Dyson electric car might have made sense. But in todays market it would have to compete with the Tesla Model 3, the Hyundai Kona EV and the Kia Niro EV and there's no way Dyson would have been able to make anything with similar specs at a similar price.

purple_ducks 7y ago
> I have no doubt Dyson could have made a decent one, I have nothing but doubt Dyson could have made one, let alone a decent one.
- hiven 7y ago
  Agree. He makes plastic overpriced vacuums, he needs to know his limits. As a Hullavington local I have nothing but disdain for this man.
- beerandt 7y ago
  They already know electric motors and batteries. That gives them at least an edge. And marketing bs aside, the motors themselves are an impressive technical feat. Although they're high rpm & low torque, so maybe not applicable.
  - acoye 7y ago
    > They already know electric motors and batteries. That gives them at least an edge. I'd like to argue batteries and mass production are the issue and genuinely hard to solve. Not async motors and inverter circuits. To my knowledge they use 3rd party batteries for applications where it is not a limiting factor that need to be pushed over but I could be wrong.
  - antonvs 7y ago
    Dyson's non-vacuum products don't have a great track record. The Dyson fans are some of the noisiest fans you can buy. It seems unlikely that they'd be able to make a successful transition to EVs.
- acoye 7y ago
  Agreed, given their product line, been more about good looking plastic toys than actual 'good' things a car was really a moon shot. OK they may have ended licensing something to Daimler or the like but still doubtful.
jandrese 7y ago
15-20 years ago the battery tech wasn't there to make a decent and affordable electric car. These days we should be seeing electric cars from all manufacturers, except that many of them are hidebound old fossils that really didn't want to touch this electric car stuff. As for a Dyson car, I think he may have had trouble figuring out a way to make the entire thing out of cheap plastic. Tesla is filling a huge market vacuum which is how they're able to grow so quickly. Every other car manufacturer was so married to the ICE that they never seriously considered a fully electric vehicle. Even when GM was basically forced to at gunpoint they did everything they could to make sure none of them would escape into the wild, and even the Bolt is treated like a redheaded stepchild. The bad news for Tesla is that some of the other companies are starting to pull their heads out of their asses and may offer some actual competition in a couple of years. The good news is that Tesla will be big enough to compete with them when they finally do show up.
- NotSammyHagar 7y ago
  I think the reasons legacy vendors are not embracing electric cars are because (1) their expertise is in gas and diesel powertrains, and all that stuff about emissions, transmissions etc is not needed. (2) their dealers make a lot of their revenue from service, and evs don't have much service, and with Tesla they don't even have those irritating dealers (3) the second order effect that lack of battery supply, makes it hard to make many of them and they are going to be more expensive if they don't have a massive supply.
  - clouddrover 7y ago
    > I think the reasons legacy vendors They aren't "legacy vendors", they are the world's biggest car companies. The reason that they're still making ICE cars is because that's what people are buying. Toyota sold over 10 million cars last year. Volkswagen also sold over 10 million cars last year. Volkswagen will be the world's biggest EV company in a few years, but even then their electric cars won't be the majority of their sales.
    - adwi 7y ago
clouddrover 7y ago
> I have no doubt Dyson could have made a decent one, but to make it affordable they would have needed huge economies of scale, or huge risk-taking balls a la Tesla. Not so much these days. You can license Volkswagen's MEB and future PPE platforms and use it in your car: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-03/vw-in-talks-with-peers-to-share-porsche-audi-electric-know-how https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-03/vw-in-tal... Volkswagen are even interested in doing contract manufacturing. It allows small, low-volume car companies to produce cars without needing the scale or taking on as many risks: https://electrek.co/2019/03/07/e-go-electric-car-vw-meb-platform/ https://electrek.co/2019/03/07/e-go-electric-car-vw-meb-plat... It would have made sense for Dyson to start with Volkswagen's platforms for their first cars as they learnt the car business. But Dyson may have been too far along with a bespoke design already.

purple_ducks 7y ago

> I have no doubt Dyson could have made a decent one, I have nothing but doubt Dyson could have made one, let alone a decent one.

hiven 7y ago
Agree. He makes plastic overpriced vacuums, he needs to know his limits. As a Hullavington local I have nothing but disdain for this man.
beerandt 7y ago
They already know electric motors and batteries. That gives them at least an edge. And marketing bs aside, the motors themselves are an impressive technical feat. Although they're high rpm & low torque, so maybe not applicable.
- acoye 7y ago
  > They already know electric motors and batteries. That gives them at least an edge. I'd like to argue batteries and mass production are the issue and genuinely hard to solve. Not async motors and inverter circuits. To my knowledge they use 3rd party batteries for applications where it is not a limiting factor that need to be pushed over but I could be wrong.
- antonvs 7y ago
  Dyson's non-vacuum products don't have a great track record. The Dyson fans are some of the noisiest fans you can buy. It seems unlikely that they'd be able to make a successful transition to EVs.
acoye 7y ago
Agreed, given their product line, been more about good looking plastic toys than actual 'good' things a car was really a moon shot. OK they may have ended licensing something to Daimler or the like but still doubtful.

jandrese 7y ago

15-20 years ago the battery tech wasn't there to make a decent and affordable electric car. These days we should be seeing electric cars from all manufacturers, except that many of them are hidebound old fossils that really didn't want to touch this electric car stuff. As for a Dyson car, I think he may have had trouble figuring out a way to make the entire thing out of cheap plastic. Tesla is filling a huge market vacuum which is how they're able to grow so quickly. Every other car manufacturer was so married to the ICE that they never seriously considered a fully electric vehicle. Even when GM was basically forced to at gunpoint they did everything they could to make sure none of them would escape into the wild, and even the Bolt is treated like a redheaded stepchild. The bad news for Tesla is that some of the other companies are starting to pull their heads out of their asses and may offer some actual competition in a couple of years. The good news is that Tesla will be big enough to compete with them when they finally do show up.

NotSammyHagar 7y ago
I think the reasons legacy vendors are not embracing electric cars are because (1) their expertise is in gas and diesel powertrains, and all that stuff about emissions, transmissions etc is not needed. (2) their dealers make a lot of their revenue from service, and evs don't have much service, and with Tesla they don't even have those irritating dealers (3) the second order effect that lack of battery supply, makes it hard to make many of them and they are going to be more expensive if they don't have a massive supply.
- clouddrover 7y ago
  > I think the reasons legacy vendors They aren't "legacy vendors", they are the world's biggest car companies. The reason that they're still making ICE cars is because that's what people are buying. Toyota sold over 10 million cars last year. Volkswagen also sold over 10 million cars last year. Volkswagen will be the world's biggest EV company in a few years, but even then their electric cars won't be the majority of their sales.
  - adwi 7y ago

clouddrover 7y ago

> I have no doubt Dyson could have made a decent one, but to make it affordable they would have needed huge economies of scale, or huge risk-taking balls a la Tesla. Not so much these days. You can license Volkswagen's MEB and future PPE platforms and use it in your car: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-03/vw-in-talks-with-peers-to-share-porsche-audi-electric-know-how https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-03/vw-in-tal... Volkswagen are even interested in doing contract manufacturing. It allows small, low-volume car companies to produce cars without needing the scale or taking on as many risks: https://electrek.co/2019/03/07/e-go-electric-car-vw-meb-platform/ https://electrek.co/2019/03/07/e-go-electric-car-vw-meb-plat... It would have made sense for Dyson to start with Volkswagen's platforms for their first cars as they learnt the car business. But Dyson may have been too far along with a bespoke design already.