From a number of sources with access to FF’s domestic financing project, it was learned that FF (Faraday Future, Faraday Future), the electric car company founded by Jia Yueting, is seeking a new round of domestic financing, and Geely Group has expressed a clear intention to invest, while Evergrande Group, FF’s old shareholder, is also involved in the financing talks.
“Geely Auto plans to invest $30 million to $40 million in FF, to be announced next week at the earliest.” A source informed. The other source who contacted FF financing project also revealed that although Evergrande Group had a dispute with FF over the control of the domestic company, Evergrande still participated in the negotiations for this FF fundraising in China. From the public information, Evergrande Group holds 32% shares in FF.
Just yesterday, Reuters reported that FF will build a new factory in a first-tier city in China, with an initial capacity of 100,000 units. The manufacturing service partner of FF is none other than Geely Automobile, and the two sides will also cooperate in the self-driving and other aspects of FF models. Confirming this news from the supply chain, FF has already negotiated with Ningde Times on power battery cooperation.
Previously, Bloomberg reported that FF is seeking to go public in the U.S. through SPAC (Special Purpose Acquisition Company), and is currently in talks with Property Solutions Acquisition on the merger.
SPAC is a form of fast-track IPO in which the process involves setting up a SPAC platform to raise capital and then acquiring the entity’s business company to enable the latter to be listed and traded. In a Bloomberg report, FF’s SPAC platform company is seeking more than $400 million in funding to support the deal, which would value the combined entity at about $3 billion.
And multiple sources have told us that FF will file SPAC listing materials in the last two weeks at the earliest, with domestic financing matters expected to be announced at that Time.
FF and Geely were asked for confirmation of the above information, and both sides declined to comment.
FaradayFuture was founded in 2014 by Jia Yueting, the founder of LeTV Group, to position itself as a high-end intelligent electric car comparable to tesla. 2016 saw the collapse of the LeTV system, and Jia flew to the US to invest in the car-making project Faraday Future, seeking a chance to turn around. However, FF financing has been repeatedly frustrated, and the mass production of the first car FF91 has been repeatedly delayed.
In October 2019, Jia released a personal bankruptcy reorganization plan, which will formally transfer all personal assets identified by the U.S. court, i.e., all personally held FF equity and related income rights, to a creditor trust. The person who will replace Jia Yueting in FF is former BMW Vice President Bi Fukang (Carsten Breitfeld).
However, it is a question mark whether Jia will really let go of FF’s car-making business. A number of LeTV employees who had previously initiated arbitration told 36 Krypton that they had recently received long-overdue salaries and some suppliers had also received arrears, “Jia Yueting wants to carry out FF business in China, so he has to pay back the domestic debts first,” a LeTV employee analyzed to 36 Krypton. The news of Jia’s imminent return to China is also circulating within LeTV. But people who have access to FF fundraising projects say they don’t know where Jia Yueting is yet.
The company’s pre-IPO valuation was only about $5 billion in 2020, but less than a year after listing, the market value has reached about $30 billion, up more than six times. According to 36 Krypton, the Pre-IPO valuation of Wima Auto and Zero Run Auto are below RMB 40 billion, but brokerage firms have preset their IPO market value at RMB 80 billion or even higher.
The capital boom continues to be high, whether it’s Byton Auto, which has been halted for six months, or FF, which has been in turmoil for years, is trying to grasp the hope of going ashore.
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