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EP 5: Gianfranco Pizzuto: the journey from agricultural machinery to electric hypercars
28 Plays2 months ago
In this week's episode John Stech, host of The Auto Ethnographer, has a conversation with with Gianfranco Pizzuto, Founder and CEO of Automobili Estrema, a company designing and preparing the Fulminea e-hypercar for launch. He also reveals plans for a new, as-yet, unannounced project.
Born and raised in northern Italy where the borders of Austria and Switzerland converge with his native country, Gianfranco was raised bi-lingual Italian and German. He attributes his upbringing to his success in navigating across cultures in the business world.
Long before his dream of building a car came to be, Gianfranco was a co-founder and Vice President at FAE Group, a manufacturer of agriculture and forestry attachments for tractors.
He went on to become Fisker Automotive’s first investor in 2007, working together with founder Henrik Fisker in realizing a hybrid-electric premium sports car. Gianfranco was not only an investor in Fisker but also a distributor in several European countries.
Following the bankruptcy and demise of Fisker, Gianfranco continued to innovate in the electric vehicle arena. He founded Scuderia-e, a company which would convert American specification Fiat 500e vehicles to European specification. But that was not all. The company redeveloped the battery, battery management system, and charging capability to improve the vehicle beyond the original that had left a Fiat factory.
With the onset of Covid, Gianfranco’s engineering team convened virtually to discuss the dream of building an electric hypercar. Weekly meetings solidified the dream into reality, resulting in first a small scale model being built but ultimately a full-size vehicle. The Fulminea is still under development but launch plans are in place. To learn more about Automobili Estrema and the Fulminea, you can visit the website at
Returning from a recent trip to China, where he visited Xiaomi’s automobile factory, Gianfranco recalls his impressions and issues a caution to Western competitors about the competitiveness of China’s technology and the national spirit for success.
Visit The Auto Ethnographer's homepage for more information about the podcast series at https://www.auto-ethnographer.com
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Transcript
Xiaomi's Tech Empire: Dyson, Apple, and Tesla Combined?
00:00:00
Speaker
What is Xiaomi? Xiaomi is Dyson, Apple, and Tesla together.
Introduction to the Podcast: Culture and Cars
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Auto Ethnographer. I'm John Steck, your host on this journey. We travel the globe to bring you stories about culture and the global automotive industry.
00:00:16
Speaker
Fasten your seatbelt and let's get started.
Guest Feature: Gianfranco Pizzuto on Electrification
00:00:20
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Auto Ethnographer. On this episode this week, we have a very interesting guest coming in from Italy.
00:00:30
Speaker
We have Gianfranco Pizzuto. He is the founder and CEO of Automobility Estrema. This is a very exciting show because we have a very big and interesting background with regards to electrification and the auto industry across a number of different countries where Gianfranco has been operating his business.
Automobiles Estrema: The Birth of an Electric Hypercar Company
00:00:57
Speaker
Gianfranco is an entrepreneur. no He's a real go-getter with a passion for the auto industry, especially for performance vehicles and electrification. He has a knack for identifying trends and then fusing cutting-edge technology together with real-world applications.
00:01:16
Speaker
Five years ago, founded Automobiles Estrema, This is an electric hypercar company based in Lodina, Italy, the heart of Italian supercars.
00:01:29
Speaker
The Fulminea, which translates as lightning fast, is beautiful. You need to see it and I'll try to put a link to the vehicle in the podcast.
00:01:42
Speaker
This company was born out of a separate venture, Scuderia E. which adapted Fiat 500E vehicles from the American market to the European market with different specifications.
From Agriculture to Electric Dreams: Pizzuto's Career Journey
00:01:57
Speaker
He was also the first investor of the original Fisker Automotive, the EV company that was born in the early 2000s and unfortunately found its demise in 2013 following a bankruptcy.
00:02:11
Speaker
He also started his career with some slightly, let's say, slower products. These were mostly in the agriculture and construction business, as well as forestry.
00:02:25
Speaker
Attachments on tractors. Of course, now his life is much more fast as he is developing this electric hypercar. With that, I'd love to give the floor over to Gianfranco.
00:02:42
Speaker
Welcome to the Autoethnographer. and I look forward to our conversation today. Thank you very much, John, for the kind invite. and I really appreciate all the background that you just listed. It's a 40-year journey that I have in the industry.
00:03:05
Speaker
and not like you were mentioning in the act sector with tractors but that's nothing really new because somebody else before me did something similar which is a renowned name in the Italian automotive sports car history in Mr. Ferruccio Lamborghini so he also started the business with tractors actually So, and it seems I think it's similar, i didn't buy a Ferrari to then turn into Fulminia like ah it happened to Mr. Lamborghini, that he was pretty upset with the performance of his Ferrari and that's the reason why then after arguing with Enzo Ferrari he decided to do his own.
00:03:50
Speaker
ah supercar. So in my case it was ah simply a dream I had since I was a little kid ah that I wanted to do ah something with cars. okay I didn't know when I was little of course ah what I was expecting then once I was getting a little bit older.
Fisker Automotive: From Investment to Bankruptcy
00:04:12
Speaker
um And yes, and in 2007, I had the chance to actually sell my business to my other partners. And with the capital, with a part of the capital I was getting, I decided to invest ah with Henry Fisker's idea of this electric plug-in by the time, a sport car, which was the Fisker Karma.
00:04:38
Speaker
And by the time I also lived in the US, I was based in Atlanta, Georgia, because my previous company had the US and North America operation in Atlanta. Atlanta is pretty big.
00:04:51
Speaker
ah with ACK companies and of course there is a lot of... By the time after you know the Olympic Games, Atlanta was a booming city and a lot of construction going on. And so I realized that the machine that we had designed in Italy could also work in the construction business.
00:05:12
Speaker
And actually the agent I had there, because initially before having the headquarters, I had an agent that was working for us on a commission base.
00:05:23
Speaker
And with this agent, he said, you know, ah in Europe, you use the mechanical ah PTO shaft attached to a tractor. But here in the US, we like to do all hydraulic, you know, all with this skid steer loaders.
00:05:38
Speaker
And so he... and said, okay, let's try to apply your machine to the skid steer loaders and have, ah instead of a ah mechanical drive shaft, have a pump and and in in a motor and and run it hydraulically. and And so we started the U.S. operation out of the intuition of the agent we had back then.
00:06:02
Speaker
And we became really very, very successful. We became so successful that Caterpillar asked ah to produce these machines for them as well.
00:06:14
Speaker
But one of the conditions were that we would have to be in US, closer to the North American market, you know because time difference, the distance and everything was a little bit compromising for them.
00:06:29
Speaker
And so I decided to move all my family. I remember the day ah where I went into the meeting with my other two business partners. And I said, hey, Caterpillar is going to order 500, at least 500 units every year of of of this model here for the attachments.
00:06:49
Speaker
And they said, okay, who is going to the US? And I said, I'm going. And they say, seriously? I said, yeah, why not? So I moved there ah with my family with the by the time I had only the first two kids, the third came later.
00:07:04
Speaker
And so my my wife and I and the two kids went to Atlanta and we picked a home and we built up ah this fantastic company, which is existing still today. and by And by the way,
00:07:18
Speaker
the The guy that um I took when I decided to leave the company, the guy I took is still there managing the company. So it makes makes me very proud about also having made the right choice that ah the the the company that I left was continuing to be successful. And it is a very successful company in in its field.
00:07:40
Speaker
So um with this selling of my stock to my other partners, I had this... amount of money and I said okay, I told my wife I want to do a car.
00:07:52
Speaker
I am i looking to, first of all, I was thinking about doing a car just by myself with some of the the the people I knew and then I was reading a German magazine, a German car magazine which is very very famous in Germany, and because you are half German, ah John, I guess you know Automotoren Sport, which is, you know I think, one of the top magazines in in in Europe in general, but of course in in Germany.
00:08:22
Speaker
And because I do speak German, my wife is German, and I'm i'm growing up or I was growing up in an era in Italy where it it was belonging to the Austrian Empire once. So we still ah speak German and Italian here. And therefore, I'm completely bilingual.
00:08:40
Speaker
and and And that's the reason why i bought Automotor Sport. And there was an article about Henrik Fisker leaving Aston Martin and having his own company, which by the time was Fisker Coachbuilt. So he was like a coachbuilder.
00:08:57
Speaker
and i said oh i'm going to I said to my wife, I'm going to call this guy. Then I figured out the number on the internet. I called him and I said, I'm here in Atlanta and I would like to invest in your idea.
00:09:10
Speaker
um'm um At least I'm interested. and So I went to Irvine. I took the flight from Atlanta to Orange County Airport or John Wayne.
00:09:21
Speaker
This airport has i a half a dozen names. So I went there and I met with him and his other partner, Barney Kohler. um We went to, um it it was like, I don't remember, it was it Ruth Chris? It was like a steakhouse in Newport Beach. so And he was taking a napkin and on a napkin, he he designed the karma basically with,
00:09:46
Speaker
you know There are people that have a sense of talent for design and he for sure has that kind of talent. He's missing a lot of other talents but he he knows how to design.
00:09:58
Speaker
So he was drawing this super sleek car and he said and I have a powertrain for the car as well because that that was the thing. you know yeah you need to have okay You know how to do a car, how to design a car but on what base are you then developing the car and he said I have a powertrain I have a company called Quantum Technologies that is not far away from our location and they have a plug-in electric powertrain I had no idea what the plug-in hybrid powertrain meant back then of course
00:10:41
Speaker
and And so we went to to quantum technology and they showed me this powertrain, which was, by the time, fit on a kind of all-wheel drive military kind of vehicle.
00:10:58
Speaker
ah called the Aggressor. okay And it had the capability to do 50 miles on electric, so moving silently through the lines, through the enemy lines.
00:11:09
Speaker
And then, of course, when the operation was then over, ah they could recover with a gasoline engine and do then the distance eventually when the battery was empty, right?
00:11:21
Speaker
So this was the powertrain. This was the story actually how Fisker Automotive started. with a design on a napkin and an existing powertrain from quantum technology that then we decided to become the powertrain for the physical karma.
00:11:38
Speaker
And that that sparked of course my interest, my excitement and and so I decided to invest the first ah two million dollars. So the very very first two million dollars that came to the Fisker Automotive which was just founded because the actual company was called Fisker Coach Build where they modified and they they they did the design services for third parties for other OEM and by the way a lot of people
00:12:11
Speaker
don't know that actually the the Fisker, Henrik Fisker designed the Model S for Elon Musk and this is why we had then also one of the reasons we had to deal with Elon Musk back then and because he didn't like the fact that we then had our own car and then he he said that basically we were stealing the technology and that our design was better, that the Fisker Karma looked better than the Model S and and so on and so forth.
Adapting the Fiat 500E for Europe
00:12:43
Speaker
And we had also a lawsuit or he initiated a lawsuit against Fisker Automotive, which he lost, by the way. okay So that that was also my first contact with Elon Musk, the old Elon Musk, not the actual Elon Musk, which seems to be completely somebody else. right Well, um a long story short, we had a lot of hypes at the beginning.
00:13:08
Speaker
We were the new kid on the block. We were much, much more successful than Tesla at the beginning. ah But then the push that we received from the bigger investors, because I came in with the first $2 million, dollars as I said, ah but this was by far not enough to complete the whole thing. So at the end, I think ah more than a billion dollars ah dollars were invested directly, indirectly in the project. And and the result was the bankruptcy at the end.
00:13:44
Speaker
ah There are many, many, many reasons for why that happened, but one of the main reasons, ah reasons at least this is my opinion, is that the push of the Silicon Valley investors, you know, Klein of Perkins and all the others that came in that wanted to rush to to go to the stock market,
00:14:09
Speaker
and then have you know their return, of course. That kind of stress, that kind of push ah was toxic for the the project itself. There were other reasons also.
00:14:22
Speaker
A lot of money were wasted and it was not used in a wise way. um a lot of you know A lot of mistakes and errors and so on and so forth.
00:14:35
Speaker
But I think at the end, that the the what ultimately ah was making the project unsuccessful was this kind of pressure we all had to rush to the stock market so that the big investors, not the little ones like me and others, but the big investors could get their buck out ah quickly and then tenfold, a hundredfold, whatever.
00:14:59
Speaker
And the the car was not ready to go into production. um Still, we started production and we had a series of failures, ah basically through the battery pack that was another produced by another startup called A123. And they and they they they had defect cells.
00:15:23
Speaker
They delivered defect cells so that ah quite ah an interesting number of cars caught on fire. because of the leakage of this battery pack.
00:15:35
Speaker
And then it caused ah shortcuts and then you know the the the whole story with the domino effect that you then have a fire inside a car. so You can imagine this is coming in the in the moment where you are supposed to be launching the product and then it backfires.
00:15:53
Speaker
And of course, you're not meeting then ah what is supposed to be ah the requirement from ah you to get to the stock exchange, to be to be then um a serious company or treated as a serious company. So that that was a kind of...
00:16:10
Speaker
a very huge problem that was not able to be solved in time ah if we would have had like another six to twelve months time to finish the development of car we would today tell completely another story but that wasn't possible and and that's the problem many times when um big investor ah groups are entering something that they don't know um they expect to be you know like a lot of tech companies Facebook, Google, Apple and so on and so forth they don't have to do homologation crash test and all that stuff that you have to do when you have a car
00:16:59
Speaker
And then US market is different from the European market and then it's different again for China and so on and so forth. So it's a long process. It's very costly and very time ah intensive and and and also capital intensive.
00:17:16
Speaker
So they they thought you just press a button and then the whole thing runs, right? So that was not the case and so we went into a deadly spiral which at the end in 2013 brought us to the ah bankruptcy, Chapter 11 bankruptcy. And then in 2014, it was acquired by a Chinese corporation, which is the Wangshian Group.
00:17:40
Speaker
So the Wangshian Group in February 14, we'll never forget the day, February 14, 2014, they had better bid they had the better bit and then they took the asset of Fisker Automotive and A123, also the the battery company, and they decided then to turn the name into Karma Automotive. so they use the model, the name of the model and transform it into the name of the company.
00:18:13
Speaker
So today the company still exists. It's called Karma Automotive. They do um a kind of new edition of the original Fisker Karma and and the the new edition is sold in very, very low numbers in very limited markets.
00:18:31
Speaker
I don't know much about the situation today calm out automotive because I don't belong to the company or I have nothing to do with the company anymore. What I have of course followed was then the rise again and then the bankruptcy 2.0 of my former partner Henrik Fisker with his Fisker Ocean and well I don't want to comment because I think every everyone can have his own opinion on what happened
00:19:04
Speaker
it It is just sad because I think the ah you know the product itself was was okay. It was a decent product, good design, and he had the chance really to resurrect somehow his own name in a good way.
00:19:21
Speaker
and it didn't go. and So it's bankrupt. and Unfortunately, every time someone goes bankrupt and in the EV world, it hurts. It hurts me personally because i still believe that, of course, EV is the way to go, simply.
00:19:40
Speaker
And then from that day, 2014, I had to see what else can I do in my life. And then I went back to California and I saw all these Fiat 500s, the electric Fiat 500 that Mr. Marchionne didn't want because he was ah losing money on each car that was actually...
00:20:00
Speaker
i I think he famously, ah believe he famously said that he loses like $15,000 on every one, that the fewer he sells, the more money he makes.
00:20:13
Speaker
Yeah, but he didn't say why. He didn't say why. the the As I know the product in and out ah very well, very, very well. ah The reason was that he was retrofitting an ICE ah version of the Fiat 500 that was made in Mexico in a former Chrysler factory.
00:20:34
Speaker
So you have to think about that from the production line where you usually do an ICE version, you have then to transform it. so take take the engine out and and put the electric motor in etc and by the way the cars were produced by a joint venture between Samsung and Bosch okay so Samsung was doing um the the battery pack and Bosch was doing the electrification and everything so the project was ah born
00:21:10
Speaker
out of initial ICE project project, so an internal combustion engine project. So of course it's going to be very very expensive. and then back then we are talking about 2014-2015 so it's 10-11-12 years ago ah the cost of the battery pack and everything was much much higher than than today and that's reason why it had a very small battery pack and it had no fast charging capability you could only charge at 7.4 kilowatt ah maximum capacity and and it was not even DC was AC
00:21:50
Speaker
So you could basically charge at home. Right. And with the limited range, I think the maximum range, you if you weren't driving too fast, was 80, 90 miles, 100 miles in summer, maybe when it's flat and you're not driving too fast.
00:22:08
Speaker
Because the battery was like 24 kilowatt hour battery pack. So 24 kilowatt hour, you cannot expect wonders, of course, with this little energy in the car.
00:22:19
Speaker
And if I may add, sure the Fiat 500, just the concept itself, the size of the vehicle and the fact that it it was electric at that time, it just did not fit into the U.S. market, right? Yeah, yeah. it's Essentially a two and a half seater.
00:22:38
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Two and a half seater, right. I think it was just ah ah for Markeone back then, it was the cheapest way ah for the California mandate ah to avoid to pay penalties. Because what is the option here?
00:22:55
Speaker
Either you pay the penalties because you sell sell the Maseratis and the Ferraris and so on and so forth. ah or you you you do an electric car. And ah he decided to go the way where the the least...
00:23:09
Speaker
um convenient solution from you know from our, what makes sense from an automotive spirit, let's say, ah he decided to take what was the least ah investment on making an electric car.
00:23:27
Speaker
He never meant to have this car being successful in terms of sales and revenues. He just did it because he had to do it, right? There was no option. And then later on, a lot a lot of people maybe don't recall, but later on FCA, because it was not Stellantis.
00:23:45
Speaker
Today they are in the conglomerate called Stellantis. ah back then Back then it was ah FCA. and i And I wanted Marconi. So I met Marconi a couple of times and I wanted Marconi to actually buy Fisker.
00:24:01
Speaker
you know But because I said rather of you turning Fiat 500 into electric and and then pay Tesla for the CO2 credits.
00:24:12
Speaker
ah By the time ah FCA was paying like 300 million dollars or even more a year ah to to buy the credits from Tesla you know so that they don't pay pay the fines in the US s and in the European community to Brussels.
00:24:31
Speaker
I said why and I presented him a plan where ah without spending cent ah he could take over Fisker. So that was before Wang Xian, before the bankruptcy.
A Missed Opportunity: Marchionne and Fisker
00:24:45
Speaker
was months before where I tried to to rescue somehow also my investment.
00:24:52
Speaker
And i tried to convince Marcioni to take Fisker Automotive. So instead of FCA, so Fiat, Chrysler, automobiles, it would be FFCA so Fiat, Fisker, Chrysler Automobiles. So I said let's add an F and and you could take um you could take all the technology we have because we also had made other models that which never made into made it into production like the Atlantic which was a smaller Fisker then we had the Surf which was
00:25:26
Speaker
station wagon of the the Karma. And then we also had a midsize SUV already designed. So we had a lot of stuff that I said, listen, Mr. Marchione, you could turn, even if you don't like and you you say, okay, I'm not interested in Fisker, the brand, but then you could turn it into a Maserati or you can turn it into an Alfa Romeo and then you would have something which is electrified and which you can little by little ah transform into a full electric ah line if you want with your all other brands. okay
00:26:06
Speaker
and i And I said, you don't even have to spend a dime. ah My suggestion was that we just exchange stock. Let's say that, let's presume Fiscal Automotive is worth $300 million dollars and the rest, which is FCA, is worth $3 billion, right? So what is the difference? Okay, so 10% of the stock will go to Fiscal Automotive and 90% of the stock will be you, right? And you Automotive.
00:26:35
Speaker
ah the the the brand and you own the technology and then you decide let's kill Fisker as a brand I'm not you know I don't need a brand but let's put the technology into what we have in the other brands Lancia, Alfa and Maserati for instance okay and i And I was hoping that this would be a win-win situation.
00:27:00
Speaker
Unfortunately, Marchionne was never convinced of the electric car. He was one of, unfortunately, one of the haters. um One that said it will never happen, it will never come.
00:27:13
Speaker
You know, 10 years later, 2025, today, everyone has to say that the electric car is here and it's not going away, right?
00:27:24
Speaker
Correct. Yeah, I think you absolutely that FCA and I did spend a few years working with FCA on the primarily on the Chrysler side, um but also working with some of the Fiat products while I was you based in in Moscow.
00:27:41
Speaker
But they were certainly fairly far behind in in terms of developing any kind of electric vehicle platform. There was almost nothing to speak of actually until and until you got to the era of Stellantis.
00:27:55
Speaker
Yeah. And this is why I then started to think about, okay, they they don't want the car to come to Europe because I contact, yeah I have a lot of friends, like, I mean, we are in the business, we have a lot of, our network is huge, right?
00:28:11
Speaker
I mean, ah one of my um ah friends of high school, and he was at Stellantis. It was one of the, chief engineers in the platform design and he went to China and they did the Iveco which is the light trucks, the light commercial vehicles and so Luca and I called Luca and I said hey Luca Can we do something? can we you know
00:28:44
Speaker
Can we electrify Lancia? Because they wanted to kill Lancia. which and I repeat, it's Lancia and not Lancia or whatever else Americans and Germans... I do know that personally. and yeah So it's Lancia.
00:29:00
Speaker
I said, let's turn Lancia into the Italian Tesla. okay We can do it. okay So everything I have tried, even if I i was introduced by very good friends that tried to help me, when it came to the top management, to to Mr. Marciano, it was a no.
00:29:22
Speaker
All the time it was a no. so um What happened then? I said okay I have to do something to have an income. right So I decided to because because Fiat in Italy was and in Europe they were not interested in bringing the 500e to Europe so I said okay I'm going to do it myself and this is when I started Scuderia E right and Scuderia E was meant to import, transform, because you know the rules in in in the US are different from the rules and in Europe. So um just the the blinkers and and and and the way that you know if you have not the CE sign on the belt then you have to change the belt because it has even the belt is basically the same
00:30:14
Speaker
retaining belt right the the same safety belt it has to have the CE tag this is another ah ah chapter worth talking about the European regulation that sometimes are just nuts so I had to do all this transformation by myself with my team with with the people that worked and then I asked an engineer that was working on the battery pack of the Karma ah Peter Gordon has said, Peter, would you help me to develop a new battery pack for the Fiat VFundi? Because here in Europe, 24 kilowatt hours of ah battery and ah no DC charging. We have cold winters. It's not California. you know We have cold winters.
00:31:04
Speaker
we have a lots of mountains and you simply don't go far with 24 kilos. you know we we I wanted at least double the capacity. So I found a very funny combination with a company in in Europe um which is known for ah the the electric drillers called Hilti.
00:31:30
Speaker
H-I-L-T-I, Hilti. So Hilti, by the way, Hilti is based, it's it's between it's nestled between Austria and Switzerland, and they are in Liechtenstein. So Hilti is a family name.
00:31:44
Speaker
So Hilti is a company and a family based in Liechtenstein. And because of friends, I used to be a ski racer, an alpine ski racer.
00:31:55
Speaker
And I was never ah really very successful, but I was okay. And it happened that I knew a lot of the really good ones, like Marc Girardelli and Andreas Wenzel and so on, you know, which were my friends. okay we We continued ah to to stay in touch over time.
00:32:17
Speaker
there are so Andreas is a little bit older than me and and Mark is a little bit younger, so I'm in the middle. and I have still ah you know these contacts. and Then Andreas Wenzel says, oh I know a guy that works for Hilti and maybe they're interested in in financing you, the development of the battery, because I know that they were trying to do some battery packs for electric vehicles.
00:32:44
Speaker
and said oh that's good and and and this is how then Peter Gordon came to Europe and he stayed here and then he was traveling between Italy and Liechtenstein at Hilti and we have designed we have designed can you imagine um with very very little capital I mean today ah you need millions and millions to design a new battery pack right and we did it with like half a million euros in total but everyone was doing a pro bono ah that means that Hilti said you just put Hilti on your car on on on your Fiat 500 you know my my own
00:33:31
Speaker
that I was using to to drive around. You just put Hilti and you you just promote our brand and we are fine. and And then I was working with with an electric um a company ah from Austria that ah wanted to promote electric mobility. So I put the stickers of them.
00:33:52
Speaker
You know, it it went all... Perfectly. we Then I went to a company in Germany that was ah designing the software for the CCS, for the ah comines the the charging combined system, which is the the standard we have in Europe.
00:34:09
Speaker
CCS2, you have CCS1 and the Americans have CCS1, we have CCS2. So it's a type 2 and then combined ah you have ah DC charging capabilities but DC charging means that you have to develop the software because you have the handshake when you go to the um high power charging system you have to go through a um a very specific software where you have this handshake where the car is recognized and and then the the charger knows how much power it can give and all that. So we have developed everything with almost no money and this German company gave us the the whole thing, the whole software, the whole controllers and everything that we needed to make the Fiat 500 capable of CCS charging so we could
00:35:02
Speaker
Think about in 2016 we had a Fiat 500 electric with more than 50 kilowatt hours of battery pack which could ah charge at 400 volt and 100 kilowatt of power.
00:35:22
Speaker
and a hundred kilowatt of of power So we could do like a 10 to 80% in like 15-20 minutes on on this car. So all this developed in-house.
00:35:34
Speaker
and And then I started to to sell, um to import from California, modify and sell the cars. And then in 2018, 2019, finally, ah Fiat said, oh, we have the new Fiat 500 coming, which was, you know, with a bit of battery pack, a complete new car, by the way, a complete new platform, et cetera, et cetera.
00:36:00
Speaker
And then I couldn't i couldn't compete. Simply i couldn't compete anymore because ah my car was transformed gray import and you had the manufacturer itself with something official, which would give you the warranty and the service and all that to a better price. And I was far too expensive. So I had to give up and then COVID striked.
00:36:25
Speaker
Okay. So that was when I finally decided to do completely something different. It sounds like ah perhaps Marchionne tried to cut you off yeah on the 500E supply just so he would stop losing so much money. Yeah, yeah exactly.
00:36:44
Speaker
You mentioned COVID and and clearly... through that phase with the 500E, suddenly everything was shut down. um you couldn't travel. And and you know with a business that was based somewhat in US, as well as Europe across a couple of different countries, it it was surely really challenging.
00:37:06
Speaker
So what did you do ah during during this quiet time? if If you couldn't import cars anymore for the five hundred e What did your engineers do? Initially, we were like everyone and and and on the planet. We were simply petrified by the situation we we never had in our lives before. i mean, i was when I stay longer than two weeks and the same on the same spot, I'm getting nervous because I'm used to travel all my life. I spent years and years and years in different countries in the world, lived basically in almost every continent.
00:37:44
Speaker
and And then suddenly, we it was early March and and our prime minister said that we're getting having a lockdown for two months. We couldn't even leave our homes unless you had a dog.
00:37:59
Speaker
so and and and and I had the luck and I'm lucky enough that I have a dog. On WhatsApp I created ah ah group, a WhatsApp group with all my engineers and designers and and and partners.
00:38:14
Speaker
ah So a dozen people and I called it Progetto Hypercar. projectto hypercard project project hypercar, right? And it was just basically the intention was so that we have something to do.
00:38:30
Speaker
We had every day, we had a Zoom call at 6 p.m. m um So we had this ah basically 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. So these two hours where we start ah having a a fantasy initially about what we could design, how ah the car should look and so we we started it was like just making something up you know just to ah to not get nuts in this time where we were not doing anything and we were just watching Netflix all day or whatever
00:39:06
Speaker
And then when COVID was finally over, we decided to do our first show car. So and first, the first one was um a model.
00:39:17
Speaker
It was smaller than the actual model. And then we decided to have a show car, which which we did. And then we presented shortly after that and then work on the whole project, the powertrain and everything it takes and then pitching to get more money.
00:39:33
Speaker
So we we have invested already a lot of time, a lot of money and and would like to be or to be able to get into the production ah finally ah this year.
00:39:47
Speaker
and And one of the reasons I was in China and I'm just back, as you know, I'm just back.
Innovation Amidst a Pandemic: Hypercars and Electric Scooters
00:39:51
Speaker
I came back yesterday was that I was talking with a series of companies, a series of Chinese big corporations in Beijing and in Shanghai.
00:40:03
Speaker
and and also there is another project that I am deeply involved which for the moment nobody knows but because you told me that this is going to be aired in about two weeks and I can i can i can say it which is ah ah very special scooter that we are designing with former BMW engineers and it's a three-wheeler threew wheeleler ah which has no need to wear a helmet because it has a roll bar.
00:40:37
Speaker
It's basically what 25 years ago BMW developed at the C1 scooter. So what we have done is a three-wheeler c1 and of course electric with a battery pack uh and very low and then the roll bar and and the seat very well protected so you need the seat belt no helmet and this is the other project that the that i'm running in parallel so and the reason why i'm telling you is because it's going to be air at the end of march and uh therefore i can say because right now officially i couldn't say it but
00:41:14
Speaker
at the end of March, we'll be okay to talk about it. This will remain a secret with with you and me until everybody else listens. i think i think this is ah plus minus what I have done in the last so many years.
00:41:32
Speaker
It's highly varied. it There's certainly a consistency. There's a red thread that follows through everything. um but i But I love how you've pursued these different opportunities regardless of the geography.
00:41:48
Speaker
I feel well everywhere, John, like you. i mean, and And we were talking before we went on recording. and It's part of our culture because being raised in a hybrid, I call it a hybrid culture, you know, where you have influence, ah my mother being Austrian and my father being Italian and my My wife being German and having ah spent many years in the US and in Germany, in France, in Africa and and so on and so forth.
00:42:24
Speaker
I think this makes you ah better man, a better person. in German, a Mensch.
00:42:35
Speaker
okay Better better the human. Because you see that ah something is good in in in one country and coming back from China, was by the way this morning I had a coffee with a friend, he said, so what how would you describe in China? i said, well it's ah My impression is that they are from technological standpoint from some advancement of society etc. They're probably 20 years ahead somehow from Europe at least ah but I think they're smart leadership.
00:43:15
Speaker
They have a very very smart leadership because Most people think that the Communist Party is a party. It's not a party. is not the part It is an assemble of managers top top top managers, which is a very tiny part of the ah global ah population of of China, which is 1.4, maybe close to 1.5 billion people right now. So it's a very tiny part. It's ah it's an elite that you have access to this elite if you're good.
00:43:47
Speaker
what I can say, what I can see is that they took the best of capitalism and the best of communism and blended.
00:43:58
Speaker
It's the only country where you see... i have i haven't seen a country in the entire planet that has this blend of total... you might think that this it is completely impossible that communist and capitalism could could live together. right Well the Chinese did it and I think part of this is that China exists since 4 000 years.
China's Tech and Infrastructure: A View from Pizzuto
00:44:32
Speaker
They have a culture that goes back 4 000 years. okay And I think this is the strength of China. that are capable because they through the 4,000 years they had up and downs, then they have the Mongols coming in, and then they had the Westerns, they had the Japanese and then the Russians etc. etc.
00:44:52
Speaker
But they were always capable of getting back and rise. On Sunday I was visiting Xiaomi three years ago.
00:45:03
Speaker
Nobody knew that this a tech company making smartphones and making ah TVs and making heating device and vacuum cleaners and um washing machines and you know so ah what is Xiaomi? Xiaomi is Dyson, Apple and Tesla together and they do it in such a fast pace um I was able to get into the showroom where they just presented the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra
00:45:47
Speaker
And believe me, $70,000 car car with 1,500 horsepower ah with such a performance, 350 kilometers an hour of top speed, packaged in a family car where five people can fit easily,
00:46:07
Speaker
Well this this is something I have never seen in my entire entrepreneur entrepreneurial life ah that somebody coming out from nothing within three years developed a car at such high level.
00:46:23
Speaker
and That's the their first car. I'm sincerely convinced that if we have a chance, we Western, we want to have a chance of being able to compete is by getting ah to work with them together and not banning them with the tariffs etc etc and isolating o ourselves. what What happened is that we isolate ourselves so it happens what the communists did in the 70s in the 80s through ah the beginning of the ninety s when
00:46:59
Speaker
ah the the product they had as half German, you remember the Trabant in the DVR? Yes, of course. So ah in in West Europe, we had the Volkswagen Golf, right?
00:47:13
Speaker
And in the East, they had the Trabant. So you you took the Trabant next to the Golf and said, what is the thing? it's It's like 20, 30 years behind, right? So ah my fear is that if we continue to put up this kind of fight, this terrorist fight, is that we are becoming the the the new communist in sense that we want to block the others to come in and show us how ah things could be done.
00:47:40
Speaker
I also want to just go back to a point you made earlier to to tie it back with what you're saying now. with With the 4,000-year history of China and the way that the the party, the Communist Party works in terms of planning, they they take the long view.
00:47:57
Speaker
They don't take the quarterly view. and And tying it back to what you said about the investors were expecting from Fisker and and pushing it to IPO and pushing to get their investment back, they they were looking for the short-term gain.
00:48:12
Speaker
They were looking for the short-term return. and and And there's this... dichotomy between the short-term and the long-term view, which one is more effective. and And you can argue that when you want to make big systemic societal or technological changes, you you really should take more of the long-term view, not the quarter by quarter view.
00:48:35
Speaker
Absolutely. and i And I told you earlier about um when I was traveling between Shanghai and Beijing, um I could have taken an airplane and then I said, wait a minute, why should I take an airplane? I know there is this bullet train.
00:48:51
Speaker
So let me see. So by using WeChat, because when you're there, you you need to have WeChat on your smartphone. And WeChat is not just an app, it's a platform ah from...
00:49:03
Speaker
From WeChat you can do anything. You can do the payment, you can order something, you can buy a ticket or reserve a restaurant or a hotel, whatever. So I open up WeChat and I go under transportation and then there is train, there is bus, whatever.
00:49:19
Speaker
So it's all seamless. So from the hotel room where Didi picks you up, Didi is their Uber. So Didi brings you for... very little money, an extreme efficient service brings you to the airport or to the railway station, whatever. So we decided together with my other partner, we decided to take the bullet train and and and the distance between Shanghai and Beijing is the same like from where I live in Bolzano.
00:49:50
Speaker
which is up north close to the Austrian border and and Sicily, Palermo, same distance and if everything goes in a perfect way, if I'm lucky there is no delay etc it takes me 11 hours to go by train with the fastest train with the fastest option takes me 11 hours from Bolzano to go down to Palermo Same distance in China, four and a half hours and a fraction of the four and a half hours at the fraction of the price, with speed over 200 miles an hour, 350 kilometers an hour, and just three stops, only in the three major cities that are long, three stops.
00:50:36
Speaker
And needless to say, it was on time by the minute when we started, and on time by the minute when we have arrived so absolutely stunning and yes of course there is a lot of control when you first of all when you arrive at immigration ah they take a picture of you they register your passport and everything so you're in the system So when you go to the station, whatever, you take the train or whatever, there is a pre-check, but they very quickly, it's very, very quickly. And then they recognize, face recognition, recognize you, then the gates open and then you get to the train.
00:51:16
Speaker
ah there is a lot, a lot of surveillance. ah that That's for sure. i mean, you you you see cameras everywhere. So I'm sure that if the Chinese government would look up what did Gianfranco Pizzuto the eight days that he was in China, they
Surveillance in China: Observations on Security
00:51:36
Speaker
can...
00:51:36
Speaker
for sure uh tell every minute when i went from the hotel to the restaurant from the restaurant to ah visit ah the business to have the business meeting to the train station etc etc i'm sure they would be able to.
00:51:52
Speaker
So you you certainly better behave because that that's, I think, also one of the reasons why there is virtually no crime. I mean, you cant you can leave everything open and you can you can keep it have your wallet on the restaurant and then you go to the restroom and then you come back and your wallet is still there.
00:52:12
Speaker
It's because, you know, ah Big Brother is watching you. Well, thank you very much, John Franco, for joining today.
Podcast Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:52:21
Speaker
Really interesting conversation. Just understand what you've been doing. I'm really excited about your full year project and love to see what that is going to actually be on the road. I'll have to keep following that.
00:52:33
Speaker
And I'll put a link to your website into the podcast notes so that everybody else can find that as well. Yeah, well, thank you very much, John. It was an honor and a real pleasure to be part of your podcast episode. And I look forward to see what's coming when you're going to be online with that.
00:52:58
Speaker
Thank you very much to all the listeners for tuning in today. Next week, we'll have another episode on the autoethnographer, and we hope you join in at that time. In the meantime, keep on driving.
00:53:10
Speaker
Thank you for joining us on today's journey. Please remember to like and subscribe to The Auto Ethnographer and leave us a rating or comment. For more information, visit our website at auto-ethnographer.com.
00:53:22
Speaker
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