It is no secret that electric cars are fast - very fast. But for many drivers, EVs like Tesla or Lucid - even Porsche - do not seem to fuel quite the same emotion as sports cars powered by internal combustion engines. To borrow the French term, the piece de resistance seems to be missing. This makes today's buyers ask: What is the point of driving a sports car if you're not feeling something extraordinary? Toni Piech and Tobias Moers agree. That is why they have set out a vision for an electric sports car that will be quick, very enjoyable to drive and extraordinarily talented when it comes to getting your adrenaline flowing. They will call it the Piech GT. And it will be ready for launch in 2028. They have set the highest bar. The goal is to make it even better than the Porsche Taycan in performance and excitement. So, what will separate the Piech GT from Porsche and everything else on the road? Let's find out. Toni Piech, Founder and Tobias Moers, CEO, Piech Automotive.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Where top executives and crazy entrepreneurs gatheredto talk about the future of electric vehicles.
This is the Driving with Done podcast. Hello and welcome to the Driving
with Done podcast. I'm your host, Michael Dunn. Now it's no secret
that electric cars are fast, veryfast, But for many drivers, evs
(00:25):
like Tesla or Lucid, even Porschedo not seem to fuel quite the same
emotion as sports scars of yester year, you know, those ones powered by
those massive internal combustion engines. Toborrow the French term, there seems to
be a little ps de raizy sdance missing in the equation. Yes,
(00:47):
full disclosure, I've been waiting touse that French term for a long time,
and here we are. This missingps de rasis dance makes Totay's buyers
ask, what's the point of drivinga sports car if you're not feeling something
extraordinary? Tony Peck and Tobi sMuhz happen to agree. That is why
(01:07):
the two gentlemen have set out avision for an electric sports car that will
be quick, very enjoyable to drive, and extraordinarily talented when it comes to
getting your adrenaline flowing. They willcall it the PCK GT and it will
be ready for launch in twenty twentyeight. How good will it be?
While they've set the very highest bar, the goal is to make it even
(01:30):
better than the Porsche I can inperformance and surpass it in excitement. You
know what, It's not every daythat I get together with two German guys
of such exceptional talent and distinguished pedigree. We have, first off, Tony
Pick, founder of PIC Automotive andthe son of Ferdinand Pik, who led
(01:52):
the Volkswagen Group as chairman essentially fromnineteen ninety three through twenty fifteen. Now,
Ferdinand Peck was arguably the most influentialexecutive in the European auto industry in
the past fifty years. He wasa giant. Speaking of giants, Tony
is also the great grandson of FerdinandPorsche, who founded Porsche AG in nineteen
(02:13):
thirty one. Now Tony has bigambitions himself, and he makes promises too,
one of which is he told meI'll never drive a car that I
don't absolutely love. Hey, howabout that for some conviction. So today
we're going to discover exactly what hedoes drive and why, And along with
Tony, we have Tobias mrs thehighly respected former number one at AMG and
(02:38):
later at Aston Martin. I askedTobias one special question, what were the
secret superpowers he developed during his timeat AMG and how is he applying them
as he builds Pick automotive alongside Tony. I believe you're going to find his
answer a little surprising, simple,direct, and very refreshed. So let's
(03:00):
get to it with Tony and Tobisfrom their base in Zook, Switzerland on
the Driving with Done podcast. Gentlemen, welcome to the Driving with Done podcast.
(03:22):
Good to be here. We havewith us today Tony Piek and Tobis
Merz, both in Zuga, Switzerland, not Zug, and we're here to
talk about sports cars. So let'sget right into the heart of the matter
right away. Starting with you,Tony, what is the number one favorite
sports car for you ever to drive? So that's that's a really, really,
(03:46):
really really tough question to answer,because I I've been lucky to sit
in a few nice cars. Iwould say probably first cut is the deepest,
So I will go with a ninenine to one Harga Turbos, which
was my first sports car, whichI've bought from what I think of as
my own money, meaning my ownproceed from being an entrepreneur in China,
(04:11):
and I bought it in Beijing.It was a press car from Porsche,
and I probably spent most time sittingin traffic with a huge grin on my
face. And that was my firstportion and my first sports car, and
it gave me another connection to kindof my family's product that honestly, I
just didn't that before. I wasso happy and it's one of those products
(04:34):
that made me happy every single day, no matter whether it broke fast or
whether it's stuck in traffic. Soyeah, I would have to pick that
one. Beijing's got notorious traffic.So you enjoyed it that sitting in the
jam? Did you find a placein China to open it up? I
gotta be careful what I say.Now, Yes I do. There's actually
quite a few nice mountain roads inthe vicinity of Beijing, and even Beijing
(04:58):
has these ring roads that if youpick the time right and if you know
Beijing quite well, you know youcan go a little bit faster. So
yes, I think I think I'veI've used that, I've used that target
for all it was were fascinating thatit was in China that you got that
car. We're going to come backto China a little bit to follow questions.
What's the fastest Not in that carnecessarily, but what's the fastest you've
(05:20):
ever traveled in a in a car? Just a bit over three hundred three
hundred where? Yes, not inCroatia, Okay, in Apukati. And
it was under control the whole time. Was there a moment where you said,
whoa, I'm going to take thisdown a notch? Both I want
to say, yeah, so yeah, and it's it's it's just interesting what
(05:42):
happens when you go so fast?Right, because you have tunnel vision,
I do have the same comparison totwo bs. I'm not you know,
I'm not a test driver. I'mnot a race car driver, so so
my experiences above two hundred and fiftyor three hundred are limited. Even though
I live quite close to the AutobaSo I drive two hunder two hundred dirty
regularly. That's that's normal because Ican because it's legal. But but over
(06:04):
three hundred is right? What kindof sensations take over at that speed?
To be honest, it's it's it'ssomething to get used to a little bit,
because it's it's it's different of coursewhen you're on the autubun and you
happen to be as I was sometimeslucky to be, to be in a
car that's quite fast. Of course, it's fantastic once you get used to
(06:26):
it. And and I wouldn't Iwouldn't want to miss it. Having said
this, though, I would picka windy mountain road any day over a
straight line. And do you havea favorite mountainous windy road there in Switzerland?
I do, I actually not inSwitzerland. There's a there's a there's
a volcanic island called Teneriff. It'sofficially Spain, but it's off Morocco and
(06:49):
uh and it's it has the highestpeak in Spain. Actually, so you
can travel from the you can travelfrom the beach up to actually be in
the snow within half an hour.And there are these roads that go through
pine forests. And whereas in Switzerlandyou're traveling a road in order to have
(07:10):
three four bends by yourself, thereyou have thirty fifty eighty of them all
by yourself. So that's just justway too much happiness and dopamine and all
these good things that come with it. All right, one follow on because
I have to ask it. Asyou describe going up and down. I
love the idea going up when you'reon the inside or near the mountain.
(07:32):
I'm terrified about going down when you'rewhen there's that cliff just not too far
away. How about you? Areyou comfortable on both sides of the road,
So you know I'm I'm an entrepreneurand a bit of a risk taker,
but I'm also happy to stay alive. So I want to say,
I don't push cars to the limit, and they usually have cars with quite
(07:55):
a lot of active safeties and goodbreaks so so so, and then don't
do crazy stuff. So I wouldsay, having said this, I've had
people sit next to me who disagree. It's so much he didn't be behind
the wheel, isn't it? Oh? My goods to be as your turn?
What's your car? It's two ofthese, I would say. Back
(08:20):
in the days, it was asa less electric drive, which was kind
of an experience what you can dowith electric drive trains cars more than ten
years ago, four individual drive trains. Each wheel had its own electric order,
and they've developed a lot of stuff. Back in the days to kind
of with the Posh guys, whichis now kind of standard. So we
(08:41):
invented kind of IVC and things likethat, which is supporting driving dynamics.
But I must say Project One waskind of well, I'll love a car,
and you know you're seeing that growingand took a while when I left
then at AMG but that looked youneed you to drive it several times.
It was kind of that's it blowsyou away. It is Black Series and
(09:05):
all these vehicles g T Black Seriesand oh GT three r S and g
T two whatever, all great,all freaking cool cars. But Project One
with the Formula one engine then youwrap it up to eleven and all that's
kind of wow. In the earlydays with not a perfect calibration of the
(09:26):
of the boost that picks up unbelievable, unbelievable. Now this is on the
track exclusively or were you on streettoo? I was on the street,
but you know you cannot you cannotuse the full force on on the streets
possible, So that was on tracks, always proving grounds tracks. That was
kind of the Yeah, I mustsay, that's that's a bunch of beat.
That's a three you reckon the topspeed. You've ever been three three
(09:50):
with Project one and well three fiftyand three forty eight and you know there's
a proving ground up in Germany,North Germany pop work with overbank corners and
going into that corner with three fortyeight that was kind of freaking scary.
But I was a bit younger,so I took more risk. Were you
(10:11):
alone at that time or somebody withyou? There? We're two of us.
We're two of us in the car. I'm driving, the other one
monitoring the tire temperature because you knowyou'll hit the corner over bank and you
got a lot a hell of aload on the rear left as we have
to beb be careful and kind ofhave an understanding what the tigh temperature is
doing. So yeah, okay,So we've set the sort of benchmark for
(10:35):
the ultimate experience in driving a sportscar. And here you guys are with
PAK Automotive embarking on a vision tocreate something even more phenomenal. So talk
about the product a little bit.It's speed, it's dimensions, it's powertrain.
You know what will be defined justin the last let's say twelve months,
(10:58):
fifteen month is kind of a Youknow, Tony presented his first concept
back in the day twenty nineteen inGeneva. I came in October twenty two.
We had a long discussion and didan assessment about the technology, was
what I was present or what Ifound, and then decided that we need
to move forward. So and nowwhat we're doing is traditional cheaty style.
(11:20):
I think you hope you saw thepictures and the play model what we just
recently kind of exposed to the public, and it's a two plus two seater.
You know, it's all about buildinga brand. It's building a brand
in that performance luxury environment and thereforeyou need a certain understanding about performance.
(11:41):
So kind of the idea is tocreate something. You know, electric vehicles
are straight line performance. Everybody knowsthat red light traffic lights there are always
no matter which combustion driven car youin, they are quicker because talk out
of standstill is the peak and theyhave to talk plot. This is not
(12:01):
a different shade it, this isnot this is not a differentiator. You're
right, it's not. There's notgoing to make a sports car. Straight
line performance is meaningless in the sportscar world in my perspective, So The
intention is to bring something to lifewhich gives you back the feeling out of
a sports car. So it startswith the battery. So we treat you
know, it happened in our worldnow with electric drive vehicles that you drive
(12:24):
the drive chain, you treat thatas a commodity. Okay, you can
do so. But in a sportscar, the engine, the power chain
is the heartbeat. That's the harmso we treat the power chain executly similar.
It is the heartbeat of a sportscar. Battery is it's not it's
not. You know, it's nota moonshot. We're talking about Standard twenty
(12:45):
one, seven hundred cells in ain a module with more than three hundred
cells combined. Immersion cool cooling meansflatted by oil. So you have a
dielectrical oil which is in touch withthe top and the bottom of the of
the cells, with the cell contactingsystem which is well the two cells,
and we have temperatures. So yeah, perfectly under control. If you guys
(13:09):
already decided where to source the cellsfrom, yeah, it is three suppliers
at the moment. At the moment, it's a company out of out of
Dubai, Taiwan. Oh I'm sorry, Taiwan, I'm sorry, I I
heard you. Okay, so closeto Tony's old stopping stomping grounds there in
Beijing, correct, so far away? Yeah? Oh, that's that's really
(13:31):
exciting to hear potentially sourcing from Taiwan. I like that. I like that
a lot. I had not heardthat before. That's big and new,
and go Taiwan. How about that? You know, and it comes to
the twenty one seven hundred, youhave some smaller companies which are not through
the journey. Finally, in Europe, yeah, you have back in the
(13:52):
days that famous E one two threein North America which is now a Chinese
company as well. Yeah, youlivered the performance cells for four MULA one
back in the days. I rememberthat quite well. And then you have
in China kind of a good arrangementof suppliers which are able to deliver the
twenty one seven hond. It's acylindric itself ormark. You know that Lucity
(14:16):
is using them so and you findin that in that arrangement a very good
compromise because cell chemistry is always kindof the compromise between capacity and performance.
So we found now a perfect wayto deal with that and through that immersion
cooling, the whole thermal system whichis applied to the vehicle is much more
intense than in a normal EV Butthis is part of the journey building a
(14:41):
sports car. I want to gowith the car on the track at thirty
degrees ambien, go ten ten lapsaround the track Hockenheim or Laguna or wherever
like Una, by the way,my favorite track, and you know,
without the rating by battery temperature,and then leave the track and with thirty
degrees MBI and the tires are anywaywarned out kind of they need a bit
(15:01):
of cool down. So put thecar directly on the supercharger and charge it
up. That's that's the brief forthe battery. Why is it going to
your favorite track? I love it, it's so natural. I don't like
these Formula one tracks, which youknow, getting the corner tighter and tighter.
That's probably enjoyable with Formula one cars, but you know, I love
(15:22):
I love the corners there. Soit's had a lot of experience and back
in the days we have many pressdrives there. I was it's a great
track still you know, these naturalradius and the corner is not going to
tight and which is not so greatfor standard cars, even for sports cars.
You can do that with Formula oneand maybe GT three proper race cars,
(15:43):
but with leading cars it's not sogreat with the modern Formula one tracks,
I must say. So we havea vision for a sports car that
brings the emotion of the traditional sportscar back into the picture, and there
is there's one edition. Then thebattery is important, and then the drive
(16:03):
thing is even more important. Andwe talked about you know, talk instant
high talk, and then you havea talk platateau up to you know,
when you see the whole refrange ofan erecte motor, which depends on you
know, is it axial or radialflux in a radio which is kind of
more standard at the moment, themaximum rev sixteen thousand, maybe eighteen thousand,
(16:26):
and at forty percent of that refrange, that talk blood too drops constantly
and constantly and constantly. That meansthat the power curve drops as well.
The peak performance in power is abit beyond a bit more later in the
ref spectrum than the corner point.This is what we how we call it
when it drops or starts to go. And this is what you feel.
(16:48):
So beyond a certain speed, thecar is not a accelerating like a sports
caring And this is why we applytwo years to the Big Ah. Leveraging
the full potentials. Electric dive meanswe have one motor with three other than
seventy five kilowad for the left wheelsimilar to the right wheel, and both
motors are going to carry a twospeed transmission. So does that mean say
(17:14):
I get up to eighty miles anhour or sixty miles an hour, then
that second gear kicks in. Youcan shift up, so you can shift
up anywhere between whatever you want.But if you shift up between let me
say eighty to one fifty and fortymiles power, you get another exactly that
kick what you expect from a froma from a sports car because when you
(17:37):
when you accelerate in a traditional sportscar combustion engine, you always run through
the power curve in the gears ofthe engine. And this is what you
miss on electric drive vehicles. Itis it's just straight lined with electrics,
and it's it gets kind of boringbeyond a certain speed because you missed that
acceleration, you missed performance. Andthis is what we think so in our
(18:03):
in our case, the seven hundredand fifty kilot, which is more than
thousand horsetball, we're going to havethat at two hundred fifty kph, so
more ths two in my spell.So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, because
this is so dear to my heart, Michael, I'm going to shoulder myself
kind of into this answer as well, in a in a much less precise
way than to be honest, whereAs he kind of explained to you how
(18:26):
this stuff happens. The vision behindthis is bringing and I think you alluded
to this, this kind of magicthat you have from a combustion engine card
that's very multisensory, that's very veryexperiential, that connects you to the road,
that connects you to a specific road, to a specific time and day,
and burns itself kind of into yourmemory. It's this luxury that at
(18:49):
least a certain target group you know, has given electric vehicles a bad wrap,
you know, because they're saying,that's their computer's on wheels. The
experience is very ago. I don'tneed to necessarily have an over the air
updates or you know, thirty menusin a huge iPad, but that brings
me kind of away from this magic. That doesn't mean that's a bad way
(19:11):
to look at it, but that'swhat that's kind of Those are the boxes
that a lot of electric vehicles tick. And we come from a sports car
culture that so far has been connectedto combustion engine cars. And our thesis
is, whereas a lot of peoplesay, oh, it's the end of
an era, we're saying it isnot the end of an era. If
(19:32):
you treat the car the way thatyou treat a traditional sports car, and
you let somebody like to bes Mercewho's the heart surgeon of sports cars,
who's got a ton of experience withelectric cars, but of course a lot
of them with combustion engine cars aswell, And if you put a team
on it that day and night obsessesabout how to get this kind of experience
(19:55):
right with an electric drive train.Our thesis is that the electric drive and
it's better than a combustion engineer's evenmore precise. There there's more things that
you can do with it. Andthat's a really nice mission to have because
it's so conintuitive to the products thatyou have on the market. And I
would venture to say, if weopened the funnel a little bit to what's
happening in the world right now.I don't think anybody but the Europeans and
(20:21):
specifically the Germans are really really,really really good at this getting this right
right. So this is also asan entrepreneur a little bit, how do
we play to our strength in thecardistry perfect I totally agree that Germans have
a monopoly there. Others have triedto muscle in, but so far it's
sort of some German magic going on. Let me ask you for a moment
(20:44):
of the electrics out there I thinkwe are looking at. For example,
Porsche of course has electric, andLotus recently going electric, Tesla electric.
Which of those commands the most respectfrom you guys, and which one would
probably feel a little bit underwhell toyou start with you, Tony with the
question, so I'll know it's aIt's a really difficult one because in the
(21:07):
end, you know, people votewith their feet. And the truth is
I currently don't have an electric car. I don't own one, and that
should tell you everything that you needto know. That doesn't again, that
doesn't mean the products are bad,but I've told myself if I can,
I will never own a car anymorethat I don't love with all my heart.
(21:30):
Otherwise I tick the bus And that'sthat's e leuxury kind of at some
point that so I have I haveowned one and for a little while.
And I have to say, forexample, and I don't only say this
because I'm I have some family ties, but the Ticon, for example,
is a fantastic product. It's noquestion port engineers are fantastic. What they've
done with it, how much spaceit has, and how it feels for
(21:51):
the weight that it has. Ithink they've done a great job. Am
I completely in love with it?No? Would? I would I go
for that before I go for anythingelse. Yes I would. I have
not driven the new one that hasjust came out, but I've spoken to
some people who had fantastic things tosay about this. Thank God. We
live in a you know, ina world where these markets are quite sensitive,
(22:11):
so you have a little bit thiskind of variety and something that has
a spin that feels a little bitdifferent there. So that's that's what I
would say. But I have tosay, I'm yearning for a car with
an electric drive train that I truallyfall in love with and that I haven't
found yet in a way that Tychonis highly impressive without making that emotional connection,
(22:34):
at least not yet. I thinkthat's where we're going with this.
Yeah, So so for for forme in specific, it's it's because the
Tykon is is quite heavy, right, and it's a four seater. So
if I had one car and Ihad to use it, and I say
it seemed like a car, itwould serve all purpose it at across tourism.
I had a lot of baggage space, so you can do everything.
But because it is so large,you know, it's you have to have
(22:59):
a lot of electrons in there.When you go around the bend, it
doesn't feel as light as it shouldbe. So it's a car that the
long red Rovat I liked it alittle bit less. And and again that's
that's just me specifically. But myfocus here also really is on performance cars
that I drive for the pure pleasureof it, right, So so it's
a little bit unfair to put itin that category. No, it's very
(23:21):
clear. I appreciate that you're definingthat and saying very clearly why you like
it or that's that's your number oneright now? Up until now that's the
one that's the benchmark. How aboutyou to bes what are you feeling?
And if I'm an engineering one ofyou, I think takes especially the last
version of the facelift's I think that'snumber one when it comes to the declaration
(23:42):
of being a sports car in theEVU EV EVU quight now and I think
you know Lotus, you know Electraand things like that, and and Avia
now or Avia. I think themist bit the point to position the brand
uh in the right way Lotus aswell for doing that Elise kind of style,
(24:03):
they lost a bit, should Isay, the roots where they came
from, and you need to repositionthe brand in a different way. It's
it's I think it's I missed thata bit. And the load to this
it is not it is an SUV. Yeah, I'm kind of maybe for
sure a great battery and a goodpower chain, but I miss the point,
(24:26):
you know what I mean? Imiss what is what makes it special?
Because you know, if it comesto electric vehicles, when when you
create a brand or you'd like tomaintain your brand, it is about how
you apply the technology, how youcreate your own story, uh, and
how you how you build a brandwith the product. You cannot define a
(24:47):
brand without a product. The productdefines an end of the day that the
brand and you need to always collaboratebetween product and brand. But from an
engineering point of view, they can't. And the new Tobo GT one now
on the notch life, that's that'sfor sure a cool car. It is
very is an engineering car. Itis the engineer's car, so to speak.
(25:10):
Yes, so no, no conversationtoday would be complete without asking you,
guys Germans, your point of viewon Tesla? What'd you take?
Good and bad? I'm happy tolet to be a first on that one.
You know, Tesla, they breakthe ground. There's nothing wrong with
Tesla. And I saw just justtoday yesterday Peter Rawl isn't talking about distraction
(25:36):
of Tesla. But I would justrecommend Peter never underestimate Tesla. You should
not do so. It is thecomplication with Tesla at the moment is you
know, as is long, long, long long Now in the marketplace,
they need to be something as asuccessor. It gets a bit quiet around
it now. It is not justincreasing the volume and put another plant in
(26:00):
East Germany and another one into Shanghaior wherever. I don't know, but
you know you need to maintain yourproducts. If you if you lose the
grip on that, if you losetraction on your products, then probably you
don't need that many plants anyway,Absolutely agree. You know, a couple
of years ago, probably within thelast year, Elon went on record saying
(26:21):
his strategy was extreme scale, andhe's backed away from that. Now.
You had that We're gonna build factorieseverywhere because people love my current product.
And just as you say, yougot to focus on product first. Always.
Yeah, if you're gonna people gonnalove your current product, but you
need to think about your future productsand if you if you forget doing so,
(26:45):
because the runway of a product isfive years, six years, seven
year in electrics, in the electrictimes, it's even you know, what
is what is a problem at themoment in automotive if your life cycle of
your standard life cycle of product,it doesn't fit anymore to the life cycle
of innovation on the drive drain onthe battery side. So you need to
think again about how do I alignmy investment because that's huge investment of my
(27:11):
product life cycle into innovations life cycle. That's kind of this is a dilemma,
I would say, at the moment, and you need to maintain the
product. You have to create somethingnew, you need to There was a
bass around Tesla. It lost thatand the early adopters everybody owned now with
Tesla. So you need now tocreate a momentum with the product to conko.
(27:33):
So I feel like Tesla's job isdone to an extent. And when
I say this, I'm saying thisas an entrepreneur. You know, when
I when I the carnistry is kindof my family business. And for the
longest time, I said, neverever want a big caught doing anything in
the carnistry because it's so mature.It hasn't changed forever. And before Tesla
(27:55):
it was true. People I think, forget how incredibly you know, kind
of entrenched and inwards looking the carentistrywas. And how long, for example,
the German cardistry laughed off Tesla.You know when when when for the
longest time, whether it's a bubbleor a phenomenon, and it was a
(28:15):
joke, and then it became theopposite. I feel like everybody was running
after Tesla. So what Tesla hasdone or what Elon has done for the
cardentistry is fantastic because it was soright for disruption and without anybody coming in.
He was the hatchet right that wentright to the heart of this and
for the customer, for sustainability,for tech development cycles, for other companies,
(28:41):
breaking into mobility, for access tocapital, for entrepreneurs, all of
these things. Tesla has been incredible, incredible. I just feel like it's
done its job right. So whetherwhether whether the world has a cyber truck
or whether there are rockets on aTesla roadster, I don't think it's going
to move the needle in the industryas much as Tesla has done and five
(29:04):
or ten years previously. Right.So I feel like, in general,
if you have somebody with such agenius, I want to say, mix
between guts, intelligence and instinct,which I think he must have right because
he rolled to die so many timesand he usually comes up. Yeah,
he usually comes up right. Mygut says would be better if he builds
(29:27):
rockets and other things, then thentry to cut his teeth on a new
Model three or something. Right,I feel like the Chinese are going to
make this really difficult for him,So I have to say, as an
entrepreneur, I'm so grateful for thephenomenon that is Tesla and the phenomenon that
is Elon Musk. But would Ithink there's so much future in it?
(29:48):
I don't. I'm not that interestedin it anymore. I think there are
other interested, kind of frontier placesthat are probably opening up. He himself,
I think just a few months agois re Re sort of restated the
company as not an automotive company,but a AI and robotics company. So
maybe he's moving to, hey,we got to move beyond because I'm getting
(30:10):
others are going to catch up withme here in this space, Which brings
me to a question when you mentionedElon one of his old buddies, Peter
Teal, I understand you're able Tonyto get funding from early days. Can
you talk to us about that interaction? How do you go to a guy
like Peter Teal, what's the storyand how quickly did he buy in?
You know, a lot of thesethings are very human, and I think
(30:34):
you know, opportunity kind of sometimescomes ringing at your door and if you
get the timing rights, you're lucky. And that's how it was with Peter.
I wrote Peter after we launched inGeneva at the auto show when we
got a lot of press, andwe happened to get a great piece in
Forts with a journalist who happened tolike our business model and to just you
(30:59):
know, sometimes the chemistry is rightand somebodame stands what you're up to.
So he was very friendly towards us. He understood what we're up to.
I think he understood also philosophically whatwe're trying to do. So we got
quite a glowing piece in Forbes,which is significant. And I sent this
to him and I just got hisemail address from somebody else and he replied.
He replied within twenty minutes. NowI have to say, he's not
(31:22):
the only person I've ever written inmy life, and I have definitely not
gotten response from everybody, but itwas, it was. It was serendipitous
because a couple of weeks later,he was in Germany looking at the Porch
Museum because he likes sports cards,and I asked him whether he wants to
have a tour of the Portion Museumby an ill informed fourth generation member of
(31:45):
the family, which was me.So we met in person a couple of
weeks later, and I got tospend time with Peter. I feel like
a little bit on my turf becauseI was walking through museum that wasn't you
know, stocked with with things I'vedone, but things that my family has
done, right, So I feellike I was able to take him into
(32:06):
an environment that he wasn't used towhere kind of, you know, this
is kind of my game. Andwhat has resulted in is I got almost
two hours with him just talking andwe did actually funny enough, you know,
because we just talked about Elon.He told me quite a few anecdotes
about his early days with PayPal andwith Elon, and we just simply had
(32:28):
a really active, interesting back andforth conversation about the industry and what we
believe where automotive is going, andwhere tech is going. And before he
got up, he said he basicallyasked me, how can I help you
know, what what can I dofor you? And I told him,
look, Peter, I need tohave a cap table on my company that
(32:50):
signifies that we are we're change makers, you know. I want to I
want to send a message to themarket that we're going to we're up to
change in the industry and I don'twant to run a legacy business, you
know, for people who love sportscards, and nothing better than to have
your name on our cap table becauseyou're the kind of guy that invests in
(33:10):
these kinds of businesses. So Itold him, you know, it's it's
I'm less focused on the ticket sizethan having you in. And he shook
my hand and said, I'm innow. Having said this, having set
this, Peter has quite a machinerybehind them, so they've done their work
and the due diligence. So thiswasn't This was the beginning of a process,
(33:31):
not the end. But but ithappened exactly the way you know he
said was going to happen. Hejust made sure that the things that I've
said were actually true and they hada team of people looking at it.
It was a delightful process, andto be honest, for me, was
it was It's just fantastic to beable to sit down with people like this
(33:52):
and get some time with them andhave a piece of their their you know,
their mind. So that was Ireally cherished that he's he's one of
one in a million, like Elonhimself. And it's I love that you
took the initiative to write an emailbecause a lot of people think, oh,
that must have been arrange through mutualacquaintances and they're at a cocktail party
(34:12):
and it just happened so easily.No, you're out there hustling and then
as you said, did you respondedhow quickly? Twenty minutes? But I
have to tell you I have so, but we have to go to the
Geneva Motor Show in order to getsomebody from Forbes to take notice of us.
Ah, you know, so there'sI think there's work that you do
because I'm sure he gets a lotof emails, right, and it was
(34:35):
very short, but he happened toclick on this link and if it says
Forbes or New York Times, thenit's different then then you know, so,
so I think it. I thinkthere was a lot of work that
went, you know, kind ofinto this. But in the end you're
write the lesson also is everybody's humanright and if you want to reach somebody,
I think putting some brain power intohow to do this and how to
somehow not waste their time right andsee what you can get DoD for.
(35:00):
And I think for him, guy, I was I was lucky to hit
the sweet spot. As you said, luck also plays a role. You
have to be coming to Germany hewas, You could meet up at the
and take him on that tour.All those things sort of aligned. Yep,
that's an awesome story. I'd liketo pivot back just for a moment.
Two. You guys are talking aboutI think twenty twenty eight is your
goal for launching. Is that correct? Or is it twenty nine twenty eight?
(35:22):
Yeah? Could you guys walk usthrough to be as moments ago you
were talking about how everything's accelerating theauto industry and life cycles. What is
the roadmap between today and twenty twentyeight? What are the major hurdles to
clear when launch? Like this isright to the point. Yeah, so
what we need to create? Youknow, you have this funding route and
(35:44):
we are at the moment in afunding round which you call a two with
that funding be gonna I'm gonna weneed after a two days of B round
readiness. You need your drivable prototy. You don't need that for out of
what if? I don't need it, but we need it for investors.
Okay, we're gonna create that.You need you need kind of that pre
(36:07):
sales. I need to finalize theintern and the extra design of the of
the two door, and there's goingto be a sibling which I'm gonna have
photo but not a photo coup.I'm not an suv because this is anyway
a very overcrowded segment that we payas a company we should move into that.
So this is what we do withthat, and this is an a
two funding round and we need toneed to close that so by late summer,
(36:31):
so to speak. And then wecreate the battery technology and the battery
is through we call it E sample, so my charging time and everything is
not just figures in this proven wetested it. It is. It is
there, but we need to createb semper readiness. I need to test
(36:51):
the battery before I'm gonna install itin a vehicle, otherwise I'm not going
to do it. I need tocreate the b semple readiness with the drive
train and put that all together withthe electrical software architecture, which is not
a moonshot, and it's not asoftware defined vehicle because I don't think that
it's so important for us. Sowe're going to lean on a Bush Electric
(37:14):
architecture and their software capabilities and createsome specialized software on the driving dynamic side
because you need a very quick signalrouting between you know, your talk control
masters so to speak, and theinverter. Otherwise you cannot handle the shift
up of two independent drive trains anyway. That that's the journey. There's financing,
(37:37):
there's engineering, there's design, there'sengineering, there's testing. If you
had if Tony was out there andhe met a bunch of Peter Thiel's friends
and they said, blank check,you don't have to worry about funding you
as much as you need. Howmuch would that timeline accelerate? Could we
do twenty twenty? You can?You can, We can speed up within
one year. This is the roomwe have. But because at the moment
(37:59):
we really focused on, you know, create the B round readiness because we
fur fit on B and C roundand maybe pre revenue IPO with all these
things, what you do usually forfinancing you need basically three years three years,
you need basically three years. Andyou know we're not we're not going
(38:20):
to build a body structure in aluminumor in steel. We're going to use
the carbon fiber top. Because weightis key on a conceptual weight and we
proved that now again and then againand again about eighteen hundred kilogram for the
two door is possible. And thatin a combination with that, so it's
gonna be kind of a beast thatreactions. When did they go with you
(38:45):
with regards to the timing, isthat the Chinese seem to be able to
shrink the product life timing down quick. They're call it China speed. Is
that accurate? Are they cutting corners? What's going on there in your view?
In my experience, for sure,the cutting corn yeah, they do.
Because you need you need. Youknow, our automotive traditional legacy is
(39:06):
full of specification and it is notcomplicated to create the car, and it's
not complicated to engineer the stuff ordesign and knuckle or whatever. What we
have in our legacy come and traditionalautomotive industry is a lot of standards to
test everything. Testing is more expensivethan creating in the bedtime. And you
(39:28):
know, the Chinese companies partially theystart legacy free, so they don't have
all these you know, bad experienceand our standards and our motive. They're
all this is the collection of allthe bad experience what we have back in
the days. Do you still needto go with the numerous leaders into the
death welly and test the ah rag. Now there's no need to do so
(39:52):
anymore. There was a need inthe seventies and in the eighties, but
not now anymore. But this iswe need to we need to cut out
some standards in our traditional out ofand then where these guys probably and we
can't see that because they treat theautomotive side a bit like a like consumer
electronic example, if we have aweek software, we're gonna send the software
(40:15):
update overnight and then it's fixed.This is probably you cannot treat an auto
or a vehicle or call like youlike your mobile phone like a smartphone,
because a car is an investment.It is an investment for the person who
bought it. A mobile phone isprobably a device, but you cannot treat
the car as a device. Sothey cut corners in testing, That's what
(40:37):
I know for sure. And wherewe establish all our v cycles and testing
and debagging and blah blah blah blahblah. This is probably when it it
cuts up corners, I see.So it may what time will tell whether
or not that comes back to hauntthem. There's cutting up corners. I
mean my Chinese friends themselves admit.They say, yeah, we we're Chinese.
(40:59):
We cut corners. That's what wedo. So up until now they've
done okay. But let's see threefive years from now how things are in
terms of reliability. Maybe a couplethoughts on of course I'm still focused on
Peter's friends writing me blank checks asan entrepreneur, but just one observation of
(41:19):
what happened in the carentistry or inthe startup field also in the last few
years. You know, there isa thing as having too much money,
and there is a thing as havingyou know, whether you're despacking or whether
you're ipoing, and you get ridiculousvaluations. People start to believe this stuff
is true, and they hire abunch of people and put a bunch of
infrastructure down, which is very difficultto recoup at some point. So I
(41:44):
would say, if I had abunch of blank checks, I hope nothing
much would change. Right. Wehave a very precise plan, we have
a very precise segmentation of the market. There's a very specific area of the
market that we're going into that wethink is quite you know, has high
margins and is very resilient. Andthere is something that in up terms of
(42:06):
the market. You know, thesethings get shaken up and then when the
market corrects, it's very difficult tosurvive. Right, So so I do
want to say if we want toif we want to create something in the
cartentistry, should be long term.This isn't about stock market value. You
know, that's shaky. It's somethingthat I think. It is a time
when you have paradigm shifts where youcan create something of value. And China
(42:28):
has done this before, right,they've they've they've they were so laser sharp
in their focus on really supporting theev revolution. Right, so there was
this moment in time where they realizedthey're not going to be number one in
combustion engines. They're going to skiplike they skip fixed line telephones in favor
(42:49):
of cell phones, and they wentrighting TV. This was a long term
strategy that really has paid off.And there were a few waves of financing.
Enough support and as you know,all the way downs paying they will
let them run and then they willcorrect. Right. There are one hundred
and fifty startups and a lot ofthem went belly up. So this isn't
the process. There's a process ofelimination that will expose by them being on
(43:15):
the market who will do a betterjob and who will not do such a
good job. But the fact thatthey poured billions into this into support of
this is also something I think that'simportant to realize. It's not a naturally
occurring situation. And as I thinkwe've seen in other markets as well,
car isn't equal car. It's notthe same if you're making a Ferrari,
(43:37):
then if you're making kind of afield Panda. I think there's also certain
segments that are easier to soak up, and there are other segments that are
just customers are looking for different things, and you can just import two managers
and all of a sudden and puta bunch of tinqua engineering students, you
know, into a huge team,and all of a sudden, this works.
(43:57):
So I'd feel like some of theproduct that they're developing, it's a
rapid prototyping process. The market ismore forgiven, so so once if the
product doesn't work, the next generationwill hit the market very very quickly.
As you said, I think we'regoing to find out a lot on these
quality issues in the next few years. But they also learn very very very
very fast. They do learn fast. They and they attack it. When
(44:20):
there's a problem, they attack.They don't think, well, well,
okay, let's revisit that later.No, they go right at it.
So credit to them. They also, guys, the time has flown by.
I've got two final questions, onefor each of you to be as
Let's begin with you your time atAMG and ASIN Martin. What is the
most important single experience you drew fromthose years that shapes your worldview today?
(44:43):
Like, what is that wisdom orthat magic you learned working at those two
very prestigious companies. A big question. No, it is not complicated.
You need to live the vision.You need to create a vision, you
know, the north stuff, andthen you engage yourself at the forefront,
(45:08):
and then the team is with youkind of not the forces with you,
but the team is with you.You live, you live that vision,
you breathe it every day and that'skind of yeah. And then you can
work together with the team on thatvision and you're gonna get there. It's
possible. That's the difference. You'renot supervising or presiding over something. You
(45:30):
are that thing. You have tolive, you have to breathe, you
have to be not not supervising,not giving instructions, not producing power points,
with with you know, with aslogan on it, make it tangible.
Be be approachable in every perspective,Beautiful Tony. My question for you
(45:52):
is, if your grand great grandfather, Fernand Porsche were alive today, what
would his advice be to you?To be honest, I wouldn't know,
right so, so yeah, soso I'll tell you what. Because his
spirit or my my family's legacy inhis spirit is something that's around me.
(46:17):
I want to say, for betteror worse. Of course, I'm blessed
that I can. I can,I can kind of tap into, you
know, this generational dream of entrepreneurs. Really, my dad was an entrepreneur,
entrepreneur really in the cardistry on amassive scale, and a massive risk
(46:37):
taker also where people didn't understand whathe was doing until many years later.
Right, So, I would say, I'm convinced that even back then,
some of the things that my familymembers, including first generation, have done,
didn't seem like the most reasonable careerchoice for peers, you know,
(46:58):
to to so you must see somethingthat later on might seem logical, but
at the time doesn't seem like themost logical thing to do, so it
would have been and I'm saying thisbecause as a fourth generation family member,
I could have had a much morecomfortable life not starting a car company out
of all things. Right, Sothis was a very very conscious choice,
(47:22):
understanding the risks that I'm taking.So my hope is that you know,
the spirits of my ancestors somewhere areprobably you know, looking down with half
a smile and half a frown becausethe joury's out. Because you know,
the difference between a great visionary entrepreneurand you know, somebody who's stubborn who
(47:43):
can't let go, is simply inthe outcome, right. The outcome is
is one part perseverance and being spartan, getting the right people around you,
which which I feel like at leastin the in the in the latter part
I've done really well. And someof it is timing, you know,
and some of it is is alittle bit of luck, and as as
Tobias said, some integrity in whatyou're doing, because you can't you can't
(48:07):
establish a vision and something that doesn'texist yet if nobody personifies it, right,
so there has to be something that'snot tangible around this. I hope
he would say, don't give up, you know, push through. And
he's built something in Europe that simplyhas has been around that will be around
for generations to come. And Ifeel like we have this time in the
(48:28):
currentustry where especially in Europe, there'sthere's this defensiveness. And Michael, I've
read some of the stuff that you'veyou've written as well. You can have
massive companies with very smart people thatare still doing things that are destructive to
themselves and their industry. And Ifeel like this is happening right now.
And the truth, and I'm nottalking about any individual connected to this,
(48:52):
is that some of these systems aren'tgoing to work. And if they're not
going to work, what are wegoing to do with jobs? We're going
to do with this crack? Youknow, this is a craft how to
make a car. If you talkto it to bus, we can make
a podcast five hours long just aboutdriving dynamics. You will not stop talking
because he cares about it so much. And it's a craft, you know,
he's he's the heart surgeon of this. This is really you know,
(49:14):
this isn't something you can just pickup in university. So I hope that,
you know, we can preserve someof this and put it into a
new business model that by itself hassome more effectiveness to it. And it
takes a bit of courage, andit takes a bit of stemina, and
you know, I hope we cancontribute to this super inspiring listening to you,
you know, as you alluded to, you could take a more comfortable
(49:35):
road. What's the Robert Frost poem? A road less, less traveled.
You're on it, and that's what'sso inspiring. And I don't you get
up in the morning you go,yeah, I'm creating something new. Yeah,
there's risks it may or may notwork, don't know, let's go
find out. Really love that Idid want to work in Tony your time
in China a little bit more,I said, we come back to it.
(49:57):
So tell us what inspired you tostudy China even go to China,
because that's also a road less traveled. It is, and you know,
we all have our stories kind ofsaid, and it's difficult to really get
to the truth because I think alot of instinctively what I've always tried to
do, starting from my education upwards, has been driving me towards independence.
(50:20):
And I do come from this kindof overbearing family, which I'm delighted to
be part of. And I've gota great education, and I had a
fantastic childhood. But for me,finding my own identity and my own success
was a little bit difficult. Sofor me, spending time in China,
where people would never dream of connectingme to my family legacy, I was
(50:45):
just a foreigner who happened to speakChinese, was so liberating for me.
And even though I do, youknow, I sacked the deck a little
bit because I did choose my timein China very kind of just positively for
me. Really, I walked intosuccess in China, really did. But
I have to say my time inChina gave me the illusion that what I
(51:07):
what I built there was me,wasn't my legacy, wasn't somebody else,
was nepotism. And that's really helpfulbecause people can smell this, whether you
can stand on your own two feetor not. So I think this gave
me a lot of the courage ofdoing what I'm doing today. Yes,
one hundred percent, stand on yourgo there. You're your own person,
starting from scratch, and you builtit. Love that. Thank you.
(51:30):
Tony, thank you to bs.Phenomenal conversation. I wish it could go
longer. Maybe we'll do a parttoo soon, but do keep us informed.
The last question is how do peoplesay there of the Peter tal Ilk
out there and they have money andthey want to invest or get involved or
learn more. What's the easiest wayto connect with you, guys? Go
to our website pH dot com,P I E. C h dot com,
(51:52):
so there's bound to be something therewhere you can wiggle yourself through.
Otherwise, you have a first namedot last name at pH dot com and
that's that's our email addresses, soyou you will get dot P at pH
dot com. That's the one that'sthe one all my name dot So it's
(52:14):
always the same, like a corporatestructure. Yes, dot something at something
beautiful And Michael, it's not atrivial thing that you're asking you, right,
because what we're doing is something thatis a mission that we would hope
that people who both like to makea good deal and be part of something
that they believe in with some otherpeople. Is a tribal thing that that
(52:37):
this is how you create momentum.And this is the same as if you
work together with people. Then ifit is investors, then if it is
clients. It only works if peoplebelieve in this thing. Hey, gentlemen,
thank you again for your time thisevening. Really I think it's time
for a beer over there and onthis side of the on this side of
(52:58):
the ocean. So thank you again, gentlemen. Best of luck in this
magnificent endeavor. I can feel thevibe, I can feel the energy.
I know you're going to be abig success. Thank you, thank you,
Thank you so much, Michael.We're trying hard, all right,
talk to you. History shows usthat the very best entrepreneurs set audacious out
(53:27):
their goals, then they get afterhim. Here are three takeaways from our
conversation today. One, piic Automotiveis building a product to meet a need.
That's good news. There are alot of people out there who are
hungry for an electric car that getstheir heart racing beyond those first four seconds
of acceleration. That's the key.Two. I love the story of how
(53:50):
Tony captured the attention and then laterthe confidence of Peter Thiel, planning,
persistence, guts luck, it's allthere. And three, the one open
question is Tesla has the company moreor less served its purpose after totally disrupting
the legacy automakers, or will therebe more pulse racing surprises yet? From
(54:10):
Elon Muskin co Hey, look,building a car company from scratch is a
monumental endeavor. Building the world's bestelectric sports car is stratospheric, like something
like I don't know planning to colonizeMars. This is what makes the PC
automotive story so fascinating and what makesme want to see Tony and Tobs and
(54:34):
their team succeed beyond their wildest dreams. Hey, thank you everybody for listening
to this episode. I am MichaelDunn and this is the Driving with Done
podcast where you meet the experts creatingthe technology that will power tomorrow's cars electric
autonomous software. To find this isa Driving with Done podcast. Thank you
(54:59):
for joining the this episode of theDriving with Done podcast. To connect with
Michael Donn, visit Doninsights dot comor find Michael on x or LinkedIn.
This is the Driving With Done Podcast
Where top executives and crazy entrepreneurs gatheredto talk about the future of electric vehicles.
This is the Driving with Done podcast. Hello and welcome to the Driving
with Done podcast. I'm your host, Michael Dunn. Now it's no secret
that electric cars are fast, veryfast, But for many drivers, evs
(00:25):
like Tesla or Lucid, even Porschedo not seem to fuel quite the same
emotion as sports scars of yester year, you know, those ones powered by
those massive internal combustion engines. Toborrow the French term, there seems to
be a little ps de raizy sdance missing in the equation. Yes,
(00:47):
full disclosure, I've been waiting touse that French term for a long time,
and here we are. This missingps de rasis dance makes Totay's buyers
ask, what's the point of drivinga sports car if you're not feeling something
extraordinary? Tony Peck and Tobi sMuhz happen to agree. That is why
(01:07):
the two gentlemen have set out avision for an electric sports car that will
be quick, very enjoyable to drive, and extraordinarily talented when it comes to
getting your adrenaline flowing. They willcall it the PCK GT and it will
be ready for launch in twenty twentyeight. How good will it be?
While they've set the very highest bar, the goal is to make it even
(01:30):
better than the Porsche I can inperformance and surpass it in excitement. You
know what, It's not every daythat I get together with two German guys
of such exceptional talent and distinguished pedigree. We have, first off, Tony
Pick, founder of PIC Automotive andthe son of Ferdinand Pik, who led
(01:52):
the Volkswagen Group as chairman essentially fromnineteen ninety three through twenty fifteen. Now,
Ferdinand Peck was arguably the most influentialexecutive in the European auto industry in
the past fifty years. He wasa giant. Speaking of giants, Tony
is also the great grandson of FerdinandPorsche, who founded Porsche AG in nineteen
(02:13):
thirty one. Now Tony has bigambitions himself, and he makes promises too,
one of which is he told meI'll never drive a car that I
don't absolutely love. Hey, howabout that for some conviction. So today
we're going to discover exactly what hedoes drive and why, And along with
Tony, we have Tobias mrs thehighly respected former number one at AMG and
(02:38):
later at Aston Martin. I askedTobias one special question, what were the
secret superpowers he developed during his timeat AMG and how is he applying them
as he builds Pick automotive alongside Tony. I believe you're going to find his
answer a little surprising, simple,direct, and very refreshed. So let's
(03:00):
get to it with Tony and Tobisfrom their base in Zook, Switzerland on
the Driving with Done podcast. Gentlemen, welcome to the Driving with Done podcast.
(03:22):
Good to be here. We havewith us today Tony Piek and Tobis
Merz, both in Zuga, Switzerland, not Zug, and we're here to
talk about sports cars. So let'sget right into the heart of the matter
right away. Starting with you,Tony, what is the number one favorite
sports car for you ever to drive? So that's that's a really, really,
(03:46):
really really tough question to answer,because I I've been lucky to sit
in a few nice cars. Iwould say probably first cut is the deepest,
So I will go with a ninenine to one Harga Turbos, which
was my first sports car, whichI've bought from what I think of as
my own money, meaning my ownproceed from being an entrepreneur in China,
(04:11):
and I bought it in Beijing.It was a press car from Porsche,
and I probably spent most time sittingin traffic with a huge grin on my
face. And that was my firstportion and my first sports car, and
it gave me another connection to kindof my family's product that honestly, I
just didn't that before. I wasso happy and it's one of those products
(04:34):
that made me happy every single day, no matter whether it broke fast or
whether it's stuck in traffic. Soyeah, I would have to pick that
one. Beijing's got notorious traffic.So you enjoyed it that sitting in the
jam? Did you find a placein China to open it up? I
gotta be careful what I say.Now, Yes I do. There's actually
quite a few nice mountain roads inthe vicinity of Beijing, and even Beijing
(04:58):
has these ring roads that if youpick the time right and if you know
Beijing quite well, you know youcan go a little bit faster. So
yes, I think I think I'veI've used that, I've used that target
for all it was were fascinating thatit was in China that you got that
car. We're going to come backto China a little bit to follow questions.
What's the fastest Not in that carnecessarily, but what's the fastest you've
(05:20):
ever traveled in a in a car? Just a bit over three hundred three
hundred where? Yes, not inCroatia, Okay, in Apukati. And
it was under control the whole time. Was there a moment where you said,
whoa, I'm going to take thisdown a notch? Both I want
to say, yeah, so yeah, and it's it's it's just interesting what
(05:42):
happens when you go so fast?Right, because you have tunnel vision,
I do have the same comparison totwo bs. I'm not you know,
I'm not a test driver. I'mnot a race car driver, so so
my experiences above two hundred and fiftyor three hundred are limited. Even though
I live quite close to the AutobaSo I drive two hunder two hundred dirty
regularly. That's that's normal because Ican because it's legal. But but over
(06:04):
three hundred is right? What kindof sensations take over at that speed?
To be honest, it's it's it'ssomething to get used to a little bit,
because it's it's it's different of coursewhen you're on the autubun and you
happen to be as I was sometimeslucky to be, to be in a
car that's quite fast. Of course, it's fantastic once you get used to
(06:26):
it. And and I wouldn't Iwouldn't want to miss it. Having said
this, though, I would picka windy mountain road any day over a
straight line. And do you havea favorite mountainous windy road there in Switzerland?
I do, I actually not inSwitzerland. There's a there's a there's
a volcanic island called Teneriff. It'sofficially Spain, but it's off Morocco and
(06:49):
uh and it's it has the highestpeak in Spain. Actually, so you
can travel from the you can travelfrom the beach up to actually be in
the snow within half an hour.And there are these roads that go through
pine forests. And whereas in Switzerlandyou're traveling a road in order to have
(07:10):
three four bends by yourself, thereyou have thirty fifty eighty of them all
by yourself. So that's just justway too much happiness and dopamine and all
these good things that come with it. All right, one follow on because
I have to ask it. Asyou describe going up and down. I
love the idea going up when you'reon the inside or near the mountain.
(07:32):
I'm terrified about going down when you'rewhen there's that cliff just not too far
away. How about you? Areyou comfortable on both sides of the road,
So you know I'm I'm an entrepreneurand a bit of a risk taker,
but I'm also happy to stay alive. So I want to say,
I don't push cars to the limit, and they usually have cars with quite
(07:55):
a lot of active safeties and goodbreaks so so so, and then don't
do crazy stuff. So I wouldsay, having said this, I've had
people sit next to me who disagree. It's so much he didn't be behind
the wheel, isn't it? Oh? My goods to be as your turn?
What's your car? It's two ofthese, I would say. Back
(08:20):
in the days, it was asa less electric drive, which was kind
of an experience what you can dowith electric drive trains cars more than ten
years ago, four individual drive trains. Each wheel had its own electric order,
and they've developed a lot of stuff. Back in the days to kind
of with the Posh guys, whichis now kind of standard. So we
(08:41):
invented kind of IVC and things likethat, which is supporting driving dynamics.
But I must say Project One waskind of well, I'll love a car,
and you know you're seeing that growingand took a while when I left
then at AMG but that looked youneed you to drive it several times.
It was kind of that's it blowsyou away. It is Black Series and
(09:05):
all these vehicles g T Black Seriesand oh GT three r S and g
T two whatever, all great,all freaking cool cars. But Project One
with the Formula one engine then youwrap it up to eleven and all that's
kind of wow. In the earlydays with not a perfect calibration of the
(09:26):
of the boost that picks up unbelievable, unbelievable. Now this is on the
track exclusively or were you on streettoo? I was on the street,
but you know you cannot you cannotuse the full force on on the streets
possible, So that was on tracks, always proving grounds tracks. That was
kind of the Yeah, I mustsay, that's that's a bunch of beat.
That's a three you reckon the topspeed. You've ever been three three
(09:50):
with Project one and well three fiftyand three forty eight and you know there's
a proving ground up in Germany,North Germany pop work with overbank corners and
going into that corner with three fortyeight that was kind of freaking scary.
But I was a bit younger,so I took more risk. Were you
(10:11):
alone at that time or somebody withyou? There? We're two of us.
We're two of us in the car. I'm driving, the other one
monitoring the tire temperature because you knowyou'll hit the corner over bank and you
got a lot a hell of aload on the rear left as we have
to beb be careful and kind ofhave an understanding what the tigh temperature is
doing. So yeah, okay,So we've set the sort of benchmark for
(10:35):
the ultimate experience in driving a sportscar. And here you guys are with
PAK Automotive embarking on a vision tocreate something even more phenomenal. So talk
about the product a little bit.It's speed, it's dimensions, it's powertrain.
You know what will be defined justin the last let's say twelve months,
(10:58):
fifteen month is kind of a Youknow, Tony presented his first concept
back in the day twenty nineteen inGeneva. I came in October twenty two.
We had a long discussion and didan assessment about the technology, was
what I was present or what Ifound, and then decided that we need
to move forward. So and nowwhat we're doing is traditional cheaty style.
(11:20):
I think you hope you saw thepictures and the play model what we just
recently kind of exposed to the public, and it's a two plus two seater.
You know, it's all about buildinga brand. It's building a brand
in that performance luxury environment and thereforeyou need a certain understanding about performance.
(11:41):
So kind of the idea is tocreate something. You know, electric vehicles
are straight line performance. Everybody knowsthat red light traffic lights there are always
no matter which combustion driven car youin, they are quicker because talk out
of standstill is the peak and theyhave to talk plot. This is not
(12:01):
a different shade it, this isnot this is not a differentiator. You're
right, it's not. There's notgoing to make a sports car. Straight
line performance is meaningless in the sportscar world in my perspective, So The
intention is to bring something to lifewhich gives you back the feeling out of
a sports car. So it startswith the battery. So we treat you
know, it happened in our worldnow with electric drive vehicles that you drive
(12:24):
the drive chain, you treat thatas a commodity. Okay, you can
do so. But in a sportscar, the engine, the power chain
is the heartbeat. That's the harmso we treat the power chain executly similar.
It is the heartbeat of a sportscar. Battery is it's not it's
not. You know, it's nota moonshot. We're talking about Standard twenty
(12:45):
one, seven hundred cells in ain a module with more than three hundred
cells combined. Immersion cool cooling meansflatted by oil. So you have a
dielectrical oil which is in touch withthe top and the bottom of the of
the cells, with the cell contactingsystem which is well the two cells,
and we have temperatures. So yeah, perfectly under control. If you guys
(13:09):
already decided where to source the cellsfrom, yeah, it is three suppliers
at the moment. At the moment, it's a company out of out of
Dubai, Taiwan. Oh I'm sorry, Taiwan, I'm sorry, I I
heard you. Okay, so closeto Tony's old stopping stomping grounds there in
Beijing, correct, so far away? Yeah? Oh, that's that's really
(13:31):
exciting to hear potentially sourcing from Taiwan. I like that. I like that
a lot. I had not heardthat before. That's big and new,
and go Taiwan. How about that? You know, and it comes to
the twenty one seven hundred, youhave some smaller companies which are not through
the journey. Finally, in Europe, yeah, you have back in the
(13:52):
days that famous E one two threein North America which is now a Chinese
company as well. Yeah, youlivered the performance cells for four MULA one
back in the days. I rememberthat quite well. And then you have
in China kind of a good arrangementof suppliers which are able to deliver the
twenty one seven hond. It's acylindric itself ormark. You know that Lucity
(14:16):
is using them so and you findin that in that arrangement a very good
compromise because cell chemistry is always kindof the compromise between capacity and performance.
So we found now a perfect wayto deal with that and through that immersion
cooling, the whole thermal system whichis applied to the vehicle is much more
intense than in a normal EV Butthis is part of the journey building a
(14:41):
sports car. I want to gowith the car on the track at thirty
degrees ambien, go ten ten lapsaround the track Hockenheim or Laguna or wherever
like Una, by the way,my favorite track, and you know,
without the rating by battery temperature,and then leave the track and with thirty
degrees MBI and the tires are anywaywarned out kind of they need a bit
(15:01):
of cool down. So put thecar directly on the supercharger and charge it
up. That's that's the brief forthe battery. Why is it going to
your favorite track? I love it, it's so natural. I don't like
these Formula one tracks, which youknow, getting the corner tighter and tighter.
That's probably enjoyable with Formula one cars, but you know, I love
(15:22):
I love the corners there. Soit's had a lot of experience and back
in the days we have many pressdrives there. I was it's a great
track still you know, these naturalradius and the corner is not going to
tight and which is not so greatfor standard cars, even for sports cars.
You can do that with Formula oneand maybe GT three proper race cars,
(15:43):
but with leading cars it's not sogreat with the modern Formula one tracks,
I must say. So we havea vision for a sports car that
brings the emotion of the traditional sportscar back into the picture, and there
is there's one edition. Then thebattery is important, and then the drive
(16:03):
thing is even more important. Andwe talked about you know, talk instant
high talk, and then you havea talk platateau up to you know,
when you see the whole refrange ofan erecte motor, which depends on you
know, is it axial or radialflux in a radio which is kind of
more standard at the moment, themaximum rev sixteen thousand, maybe eighteen thousand,
(16:26):
and at forty percent of that refrange, that talk blood too drops constantly
and constantly and constantly. That meansthat the power curve drops as well.
The peak performance in power is abit beyond a bit more later in the
ref spectrum than the corner point.This is what we how we call it
when it drops or starts to go. And this is what you feel.
(16:48):
So beyond a certain speed, thecar is not a accelerating like a sports
caring And this is why we applytwo years to the Big Ah. Leveraging
the full potentials. Electric dive meanswe have one motor with three other than
seventy five kilowad for the left wheelsimilar to the right wheel, and both
motors are going to carry a twospeed transmission. So does that mean say
(17:14):
I get up to eighty miles anhour or sixty miles an hour, then
that second gear kicks in. Youcan shift up, so you can shift
up anywhere between whatever you want.But if you shift up between let me
say eighty to one fifty and fortymiles power, you get another exactly that
kick what you expect from a froma from a sports car because when you
(17:37):
when you accelerate in a traditional sportscar combustion engine, you always run through
the power curve in the gears ofthe engine. And this is what you
miss on electric drive vehicles. Itis it's just straight lined with electrics,
and it's it gets kind of boringbeyond a certain speed because you missed that
acceleration, you missed performance. Andthis is what we think so in our
(18:03):
in our case, the seven hundredand fifty kilot, which is more than
thousand horsetball, we're going to havethat at two hundred fifty kph, so
more ths two in my spell.So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, because
this is so dear to my heart, Michael, I'm going to shoulder myself
kind of into this answer as well, in a in a much less precise
way than to be honest, whereAs he kind of explained to you how
(18:26):
this stuff happens. The vision behindthis is bringing and I think you alluded
to this, this kind of magicthat you have from a combustion engine card
that's very multisensory, that's very veryexperiential, that connects you to the road,
that connects you to a specific road, to a specific time and day,
and burns itself kind of into yourmemory. It's this luxury that at
(18:49):
least a certain target group you know, has given electric vehicles a bad wrap,
you know, because they're saying,that's their computer's on wheels. The
experience is very ago. I don'tneed to necessarily have an over the air
updates or you know, thirty menusin a huge iPad, but that brings
me kind of away from this magic. That doesn't mean that's a bad way
(19:11):
to look at it, but that'swhat that's kind of Those are the boxes
that a lot of electric vehicles tick. And we come from a sports car
culture that so far has been connectedto combustion engine cars. And our thesis
is, whereas a lot of peoplesay, oh, it's the end of
an era, we're saying it isnot the end of an era. If
(19:32):
you treat the car the way thatyou treat a traditional sports car, and
you let somebody like to bes Mercewho's the heart surgeon of sports cars,
who's got a ton of experience withelectric cars, but of course a lot
of them with combustion engine cars aswell, And if you put a team
on it that day and night obsessesabout how to get this kind of experience
(19:55):
right with an electric drive train.Our thesis is that the electric drive and
it's better than a combustion engineer's evenmore precise. There there's more things that
you can do with it. Andthat's a really nice mission to have because
it's so conintuitive to the products thatyou have on the market. And I
would venture to say, if weopened the funnel a little bit to what's
happening in the world right now.I don't think anybody but the Europeans and
(20:21):
specifically the Germans are really really,really really good at this getting this right
right. So this is also asan entrepreneur a little bit, how do
we play to our strength in thecardistry perfect I totally agree that Germans have
a monopoly there. Others have triedto muscle in, but so far it's
sort of some German magic going on. Let me ask you for a moment
(20:44):
of the electrics out there I thinkwe are looking at. For example,
Porsche of course has electric, andLotus recently going electric, Tesla electric.
Which of those commands the most respectfrom you guys, and which one would
probably feel a little bit underwhell toyou start with you, Tony with the
question, so I'll know it's aIt's a really difficult one because in the
(21:07):
end, you know, people votewith their feet. And the truth is
I currently don't have an electric car. I don't own one, and that
should tell you everything that you needto know. That doesn't again, that
doesn't mean the products are bad,but I've told myself if I can,
I will never own a car anymorethat I don't love with all my heart.
(21:30):
Otherwise I tick the bus And that'sthat's e leuxury kind of at some
point that so I have I haveowned one and for a little while.
And I have to say, forexample, and I don't only say this
because I'm I have some family ties, but the Ticon, for example,
is a fantastic product. It's noquestion port engineers are fantastic. What they've
done with it, how much spaceit has, and how it feels for
(21:51):
the weight that it has. Ithink they've done a great job. Am
I completely in love with it?No? Would? I would I go
for that before I go for anythingelse. Yes I would. I have
not driven the new one that hasjust came out, but I've spoken to
some people who had fantastic things tosay about this. Thank God. We
live in a you know, ina world where these markets are quite sensitive,
(22:11):
so you have a little bit thiskind of variety and something that has
a spin that feels a little bitdifferent there. So that's that's what I
would say. But I have tosay, I'm yearning for a car with
an electric drive train that I truallyfall in love with and that I haven't
found yet in a way that Tychonis highly impressive without making that emotional connection,
(22:34):
at least not yet. I thinkthat's where we're going with this.
Yeah, So so for for forme in specific, it's it's because the
Tykon is is quite heavy, right, and it's a four seater. So
if I had one car and Ihad to use it, and I say
it seemed like a car, itwould serve all purpose it at across tourism.
I had a lot of baggage space, so you can do everything.
But because it is so large,you know, it's you have to have
(22:59):
a lot of electrons in there.When you go around the bend, it
doesn't feel as light as it shouldbe. So it's a car that the
long red Rovat I liked it alittle bit less. And and again that's
that's just me specifically. But myfocus here also really is on performance cars
that I drive for the pure pleasureof it, right, So so it's
a little bit unfair to put itin that category. No, it's very
(23:21):
clear. I appreciate that you're definingthat and saying very clearly why you like
it or that's that's your number oneright now? Up until now that's the
one that's the benchmark. How aboutyou to bes what are you feeling?
And if I'm an engineering one ofyou, I think takes especially the last
version of the facelift's I think that'snumber one when it comes to the declaration
(23:42):
of being a sports car in theEVU EV EVU quight now and I think
you know Lotus, you know Electraand things like that, and and Avia
now or Avia. I think themist bit the point to position the brand
uh in the right way Lotus aswell for doing that Elise kind of style,
(24:03):
they lost a bit, should Isay, the roots where they came
from, and you need to repositionthe brand in a different way. It's
it's I think it's I missed thata bit. And the load to this
it is not it is an SUV. Yeah, I'm kind of maybe for
sure a great battery and a goodpower chain, but I miss the point,
(24:26):
you know what I mean? Imiss what is what makes it special?
Because you know, if it comesto electric vehicles, when when you
create a brand or you'd like tomaintain your brand, it is about how
you apply the technology, how youcreate your own story, uh, and
how you how you build a brandwith the product. You cannot define a
(24:47):
brand without a product. The productdefines an end of the day that the
brand and you need to always collaboratebetween product and brand. But from an
engineering point of view, they can't. And the new Tobo GT one now
on the notch life, that's that'sfor sure a cool car. It is
very is an engineering car. Itis the engineer's car, so to speak.
(25:10):
Yes, so no, no conversationtoday would be complete without asking you,
guys Germans, your point of viewon Tesla? What'd you take?
Good and bad? I'm happy tolet to be a first on that one.
You know, Tesla, they breakthe ground. There's nothing wrong with
Tesla. And I saw just justtoday yesterday Peter Rawl isn't talking about distraction
(25:36):
of Tesla. But I would justrecommend Peter never underestimate Tesla. You should
not do so. It is thecomplication with Tesla at the moment is you
know, as is long, long, long long Now in the marketplace,
they need to be something as asuccessor. It gets a bit quiet around
it now. It is not justincreasing the volume and put another plant in
(26:00):
East Germany and another one into Shanghaior wherever. I don't know, but
you know you need to maintain yourproducts. If you if you lose the
grip on that, if you losetraction on your products, then probably you
don't need that many plants anyway,Absolutely agree. You know, a couple
of years ago, probably within thelast year, Elon went on record saying
(26:21):
his strategy was extreme scale, andhe's backed away from that. Now.
You had that We're gonna build factorieseverywhere because people love my current product.
And just as you say, yougot to focus on product first. Always.
Yeah, if you're gonna people gonnalove your current product, but you
need to think about your future productsand if you if you forget doing so,
(26:45):
because the runway of a product isfive years, six years, seven
year in electrics, in the electrictimes, it's even you know, what
is what is a problem at themoment in automotive if your life cycle of
your standard life cycle of product,it doesn't fit anymore to the life cycle
of innovation on the drive drain onthe battery side. So you need to
think again about how do I alignmy investment because that's huge investment of my
(27:11):
product life cycle into innovations life cycle. That's kind of this is a dilemma,
I would say, at the moment, and you need to maintain the
product. You have to create somethingnew, you need to There was a
bass around Tesla. It lost thatand the early adopters everybody owned now with
Tesla. So you need now tocreate a momentum with the product to conko.
(27:33):
So I feel like Tesla's job isdone to an extent. And when
I say this, I'm saying thisas an entrepreneur. You know, when
I when I the carnistry is kindof my family business. And for the
longest time, I said, neverever want a big caught doing anything in
the carnistry because it's so mature.It hasn't changed forever. And before Tesla
(27:55):
it was true. People I think, forget how incredibly you know, kind
of entrenched and inwards looking the carentistrywas. And how long, for example,
the German cardistry laughed off Tesla.You know when when when for the
longest time, whether it's a bubbleor a phenomenon, and it was a
(28:15):
joke, and then it became theopposite. I feel like everybody was running
after Tesla. So what Tesla hasdone or what Elon has done for the
cardentistry is fantastic because it was soright for disruption and without anybody coming in.
He was the hatchet right that wentright to the heart of this and
for the customer, for sustainability,for tech development cycles, for other companies,
(28:41):
breaking into mobility, for access tocapital, for entrepreneurs, all of
these things. Tesla has been incredible, incredible. I just feel like it's
done its job right. So whetherwhether whether the world has a cyber truck
or whether there are rockets on aTesla roadster, I don't think it's going
to move the needle in the industryas much as Tesla has done and five
(29:04):
or ten years previously. Right.So I feel like, in general,
if you have somebody with such agenius, I want to say, mix
between guts, intelligence and instinct,which I think he must have right because
he rolled to die so many timesand he usually comes up. Yeah,
he usually comes up right. Mygut says would be better if he builds
(29:27):
rockets and other things, then thentry to cut his teeth on a new
Model three or something. Right,I feel like the Chinese are going to
make this really difficult for him,So I have to say, as an
entrepreneur, I'm so grateful for thephenomenon that is Tesla and the phenomenon that
is Elon Musk. But would Ithink there's so much future in it?
(29:48):
I don't. I'm not that interestedin it anymore. I think there are
other interested, kind of frontier placesthat are probably opening up. He himself,
I think just a few months agois re Re sort of restated the
company as not an automotive company,but a AI and robotics company. So
maybe he's moving to, hey,we got to move beyond because I'm getting
(30:10):
others are going to catch up withme here in this space, Which brings
me to a question when you mentionedElon one of his old buddies, Peter
Teal, I understand you're able Tonyto get funding from early days. Can
you talk to us about that interaction? How do you go to a guy
like Peter Teal, what's the storyand how quickly did he buy in?
You know, a lot of thesethings are very human, and I think
(30:34):
you know, opportunity kind of sometimescomes ringing at your door and if you
get the timing rights, you're lucky. And that's how it was with Peter.
I wrote Peter after we launched inGeneva at the auto show when we
got a lot of press, andwe happened to get a great piece in
Forts with a journalist who happened tolike our business model and to just you
(30:59):
know, sometimes the chemistry is rightand somebodame stands what you're up to.
So he was very friendly towards us. He understood what we're up to.
I think he understood also philosophically whatwe're trying to do. So we got
quite a glowing piece in Forbes,which is significant. And I sent this
to him and I just got hisemail address from somebody else and he replied.
He replied within twenty minutes. NowI have to say, he's not
(31:22):
the only person I've ever written inmy life, and I have definitely not
gotten response from everybody, but itwas, it was. It was serendipitous
because a couple of weeks later,he was in Germany looking at the Porch
Museum because he likes sports cards,and I asked him whether he wants to
have a tour of the Portion Museumby an ill informed fourth generation member of
(31:45):
the family, which was me.So we met in person a couple of
weeks later, and I got tospend time with Peter. I feel like
a little bit on my turf becauseI was walking through museum that wasn't you
know, stocked with with things I'vedone, but things that my family has
done, right, So I feellike I was able to take him into
(32:06):
an environment that he wasn't used towhere kind of, you know, this
is kind of my game. Andwhat has resulted in is I got almost
two hours with him just talking andwe did actually funny enough, you know,
because we just talked about Elon.He told me quite a few anecdotes
about his early days with PayPal andwith Elon, and we just simply had
(32:28):
a really active, interesting back andforth conversation about the industry and what we
believe where automotive is going, andwhere tech is going. And before he
got up, he said he basicallyasked me, how can I help you
know, what what can I dofor you? And I told him,
look, Peter, I need tohave a cap table on my company that
(32:50):
signifies that we are we're change makers, you know. I want to I
want to send a message to themarket that we're going to we're up to
change in the industry and I don'twant to run a legacy business, you
know, for people who love sportscards, and nothing better than to have
your name on our cap table becauseyou're the kind of guy that invests in
(33:10):
these kinds of businesses. So Itold him, you know, it's it's
I'm less focused on the ticket sizethan having you in. And he shook
my hand and said, I'm innow. Having said this, having set
this, Peter has quite a machinerybehind them, so they've done their work
and the due diligence. So thiswasn't This was the beginning of a process,
(33:31):
not the end. But but ithappened exactly the way you know he
said was going to happen. Hejust made sure that the things that I've
said were actually true and they hada team of people looking at it.
It was a delightful process, andto be honest, for me, was
it was It's just fantastic to beable to sit down with people like this
(33:52):
and get some time with them andhave a piece of their their you know,
their mind. So that was Ireally cherished that he's he's one of
one in a million, like Elonhimself. And it's I love that you
took the initiative to write an emailbecause a lot of people think, oh,
that must have been arrange through mutualacquaintances and they're at a cocktail party
(34:12):
and it just happened so easily.No, you're out there hustling and then
as you said, did you respondedhow quickly? Twenty minutes? But I
have to tell you I have so, but we have to go to the
Geneva Motor Show in order to getsomebody from Forbes to take notice of us.
Ah, you know, so there'sI think there's work that you do
because I'm sure he gets a lotof emails, right, and it was
(34:35):
very short, but he happened toclick on this link and if it says
Forbes or New York Times, thenit's different then then you know, so,
so I think it. I thinkthere was a lot of work that
went, you know, kind ofinto this. But in the end you're
write the lesson also is everybody's humanright and if you want to reach somebody,
I think putting some brain power intohow to do this and how to
somehow not waste their time right andsee what you can get DoD for.
(35:00):
And I think for him, guy, I was I was lucky to hit
the sweet spot. As you said, luck also plays a role. You
have to be coming to Germany hewas, You could meet up at the
and take him on that tour.All those things sort of aligned. Yep,
that's an awesome story. I'd liketo pivot back just for a moment.
Two. You guys are talking aboutI think twenty twenty eight is your
goal for launching. Is that correct? Or is it twenty nine twenty eight?
(35:22):
Yeah? Could you guys walk usthrough to be as moments ago you
were talking about how everything's accelerating theauto industry and life cycles. What is
the roadmap between today and twenty twentyeight? What are the major hurdles to
clear when launch? Like this isright to the point. Yeah, so
what we need to create? Youknow, you have this funding route and
(35:44):
we are at the moment in afunding round which you call a two with
that funding be gonna I'm gonna weneed after a two days of B round
readiness. You need your drivable prototy. You don't need that for out of
what if? I don't need it, but we need it for investors.
Okay, we're gonna create that.You need you need kind of that pre
(36:07):
sales. I need to finalize theintern and the extra design of the of
the two door, and there's goingto be a sibling which I'm gonna have
photo but not a photo coup.I'm not an suv because this is anyway
a very overcrowded segment that we payas a company we should move into that.
So this is what we do withthat, and this is an a
two funding round and we need toneed to close that so by late summer,
(36:31):
so to speak. And then wecreate the battery technology and the battery
is through we call it E sample, so my charging time and everything is
not just figures in this proven wetested it. It is. It is
there, but we need to createb semper readiness. I need to test
(36:51):
the battery before I'm gonna install itin a vehicle, otherwise I'm not going
to do it. I need tocreate the b semple readiness with the drive
train and put that all together withthe electrical software architecture, which is not
a moonshot, and it's not asoftware defined vehicle because I don't think that
it's so important for us. Sowe're going to lean on a Bush Electric
(37:14):
architecture and their software capabilities and createsome specialized software on the driving dynamic side
because you need a very quick signalrouting between you know, your talk control
masters so to speak, and theinverter. Otherwise you cannot handle the shift
up of two independent drive trains anyway. That that's the journey. There's financing,
(37:37):
there's engineering, there's design, there'sengineering, there's testing. If you
had if Tony was out there andhe met a bunch of Peter Thiel's friends
and they said, blank check,you don't have to worry about funding you
as much as you need. Howmuch would that timeline accelerate? Could we
do twenty twenty? You can?You can, We can speed up within
one year. This is the roomwe have. But because at the moment
(37:59):
we really focused on, you know, create the B round readiness because we
fur fit on B and C roundand maybe pre revenue IPO with all these
things, what you do usually forfinancing you need basically three years three years,
you need basically three years. Andyou know we're not we're not going
(38:20):
to build a body structure in aluminumor in steel. We're going to use
the carbon fiber top. Because weightis key on a conceptual weight and we
proved that now again and then againand again about eighteen hundred kilogram for the
two door is possible. And thatin a combination with that, so it's
gonna be kind of a beast thatreactions. When did they go with you
(38:45):
with regards to the timing, isthat the Chinese seem to be able to
shrink the product life timing down quick. They're call it China speed. Is
that accurate? Are they cutting corners? What's going on there in your view?
In my experience, for sure,the cutting corn yeah, they do.
Because you need you need. Youknow, our automotive traditional legacy is
(39:06):
full of specification and it is notcomplicated to create the car, and it's
not complicated to engineer the stuff ordesign and knuckle or whatever. What we
have in our legacy come and traditionalautomotive industry is a lot of standards to
test everything. Testing is more expensivethan creating in the bedtime. And you
(39:28):
know, the Chinese companies partially theystart legacy free, so they don't have
all these you know, bad experienceand our standards and our motive. They're
all this is the collection of allthe bad experience what we have back in
the days. Do you still needto go with the numerous leaders into the
death welly and test the ah rag. Now there's no need to do so
(39:52):
anymore. There was a need inthe seventies and in the eighties, but
not now anymore. But this iswe need to we need to cut out
some standards in our traditional out ofand then where these guys probably and we
can't see that because they treat theautomotive side a bit like a like consumer
electronic example, if we have aweek software, we're gonna send the software
(40:15):
update overnight and then it's fixed.This is probably you cannot treat an auto
or a vehicle or call like youlike your mobile phone like a smartphone,
because a car is an investment.It is an investment for the person who
bought it. A mobile phone isprobably a device, but you cannot treat
the car as a device. Sothey cut corners in testing, That's what
(40:37):
I know for sure. And wherewe establish all our v cycles and testing
and debagging and blah blah blah blahblah. This is probably when it it
cuts up corners, I see.So it may what time will tell whether
or not that comes back to hauntthem. There's cutting up corners. I
mean my Chinese friends themselves admit.They say, yeah, we we're Chinese.
(40:59):
We cut corners. That's what wedo. So up until now they've
done okay. But let's see threefive years from now how things are in
terms of reliability. Maybe a couplethoughts on of course I'm still focused on
Peter's friends writing me blank checks asan entrepreneur, but just one observation of
(41:19):
what happened in the carentistry or inthe startup field also in the last few
years. You know, there isa thing as having too much money,
and there is a thing as havingyou know, whether you're despacking or whether
you're ipoing, and you get ridiculousvaluations. People start to believe this stuff
is true, and they hire abunch of people and put a bunch of
infrastructure down, which is very difficultto recoup at some point. So I
(41:44):
would say, if I had abunch of blank checks, I hope nothing
much would change. Right. Wehave a very precise plan, we have
a very precise segmentation of the market. There's a very specific area of the
market that we're going into that wethink is quite you know, has high
margins and is very resilient. Andthere is something that in up terms of
(42:06):
the market. You know, thesethings get shaken up and then when the
market corrects, it's very difficult tosurvive. Right, So so I do
want to say if we want toif we want to create something in the
cartentistry, should be long term.This isn't about stock market value. You
know, that's shaky. It's somethingthat I think. It is a time
when you have paradigm shifts where youcan create something of value. And China
(42:28):
has done this before, right,they've they've they've they were so laser sharp
in their focus on really supporting theev revolution. Right, so there was
this moment in time where they realizedthey're not going to be number one in
combustion engines. They're going to skiplike they skip fixed line telephones in favor
(42:49):
of cell phones, and they wentrighting TV. This was a long term
strategy that really has paid off.And there were a few waves of financing.
Enough support and as you know,all the way downs paying they will
let them run and then they willcorrect. Right. There are one hundred
and fifty startups and a lot ofthem went belly up. So this isn't
the process. There's a process ofelimination that will expose by them being on
(43:15):
the market who will do a betterjob and who will not do such a
good job. But the fact thatthey poured billions into this into support of
this is also something I think that'simportant to realize. It's not a naturally
occurring situation. And as I thinkwe've seen in other markets as well,
car isn't equal car. It's notthe same if you're making a Ferrari,
(43:37):
then if you're making kind of afield Panda. I think there's also certain
segments that are easier to soak up, and there are other segments that are
just customers are looking for different things, and you can just import two managers
and all of a sudden and puta bunch of tinqua engineering students, you
know, into a huge team,and all of a sudden, this works.
(43:57):
So I'd feel like some of theproduct that they're developing, it's a
rapid prototyping process. The market ismore forgiven, so so once if the
product doesn't work, the next generationwill hit the market very very quickly.
As you said, I think we'regoing to find out a lot on these
quality issues in the next few years. But they also learn very very very
very fast. They do learn fast. They and they attack it. When
(44:20):
there's a problem, they attack.They don't think, well, well,
okay, let's revisit that later.No, they go right at it.
So credit to them. They also, guys, the time has flown by.
I've got two final questions, onefor each of you to be as
Let's begin with you your time atAMG and ASIN Martin. What is the
most important single experience you drew fromthose years that shapes your worldview today?
(44:43):
Like, what is that wisdom orthat magic you learned working at those two
very prestigious companies. A big question. No, it is not complicated.
You need to live the vision.You need to create a vision, you
know, the north stuff, andthen you engage yourself at the forefront,
(45:08):
and then the team is with youkind of not the forces with you,
but the team is with you.You live, you live that vision,
you breathe it every day and that'skind of yeah. And then you can
work together with the team on thatvision and you're gonna get there. It's
possible. That's the difference. You'renot supervising or presiding over something. You
(45:30):
are that thing. You have tolive, you have to breathe, you
have to be not not supervising,not giving instructions, not producing power points,
with with you know, with aslogan on it, make it tangible.
Be be approachable in every perspective,Beautiful Tony. My question for you
(45:52):
is, if your grand great grandfather, Fernand Porsche were alive today, what
would his advice be to you?To be honest, I wouldn't know,
right so, so yeah, soso I'll tell you what. Because his
spirit or my my family's legacy inhis spirit is something that's around me.
(46:17):
I want to say, for betteror worse. Of course, I'm blessed
that I can. I can,I can kind of tap into, you
know, this generational dream of entrepreneurs. Really, my dad was an entrepreneur,
entrepreneur really in the cardistry on amassive scale, and a massive risk
(46:37):
taker also where people didn't understand whathe was doing until many years later.
Right, So, I would say, I'm convinced that even back then,
some of the things that my familymembers, including first generation, have done,
didn't seem like the most reasonable careerchoice for peers, you know,
(46:58):
to to so you must see somethingthat later on might seem logical, but
at the time doesn't seem like themost logical thing to do, so it
would have been and I'm saying thisbecause as a fourth generation family member,
I could have had a much morecomfortable life not starting a car company out
of all things. Right, Sothis was a very very conscious choice,
(47:22):
understanding the risks that I'm taking.So my hope is that you know,
the spirits of my ancestors somewhere areprobably you know, looking down with half
a smile and half a frown becausethe joury's out. Because you know,
the difference between a great visionary entrepreneurand you know, somebody who's stubborn who
(47:43):
can't let go, is simply inthe outcome, right. The outcome is
is one part perseverance and being spartan, getting the right people around you,
which which I feel like at leastin the in the in the latter part
I've done really well. And someof it is timing, you know,
and some of it is is alittle bit of luck, and as as
Tobias said, some integrity in whatyou're doing, because you can't you can't
(48:07):
establish a vision and something that doesn'texist yet if nobody personifies it, right,
so there has to be something that'snot tangible around this. I hope
he would say, don't give up, you know, push through. And
he's built something in Europe that simplyhas has been around that will be around
for generations to come. And Ifeel like we have this time in the
(48:28):
currentustry where especially in Europe, there'sthere's this defensiveness. And Michael, I've
read some of the stuff that you'veyou've written as well. You can have
massive companies with very smart people thatare still doing things that are destructive to
themselves and their industry. And Ifeel like this is happening right now.
And the truth, and I'm nottalking about any individual connected to this,
(48:52):
is that some of these systems aren'tgoing to work. And if they're not
going to work, what are wegoing to do with jobs? We're going
to do with this crack? Youknow, this is a craft how to
make a car. If you talkto it to bus, we can make
a podcast five hours long just aboutdriving dynamics. You will not stop talking
because he cares about it so much. And it's a craft, you know,
he's he's the heart surgeon of this. This is really you know,
(49:14):
this isn't something you can just pickup in university. So I hope that,
you know, we can preserve someof this and put it into a
new business model that by itself hassome more effectiveness to it. And it
takes a bit of courage, andit takes a bit of stemina, and
you know, I hope we cancontribute to this super inspiring listening to you,
you know, as you alluded to, you could take a more comfortable
(49:35):
road. What's the Robert Frost poem? A road less, less traveled.
You're on it, and that's what'sso inspiring. And I don't you get
up in the morning you go,yeah, I'm creating something new. Yeah,
there's risks it may or may notwork, don't know, let's go
find out. Really love that Idid want to work in Tony your time
in China a little bit more,I said, we come back to it.
(49:57):
So tell us what inspired you tostudy China even go to China,
because that's also a road less traveled. It is, and you know,
we all have our stories kind ofsaid, and it's difficult to really get
to the truth because I think alot of instinctively what I've always tried to
do, starting from my education upwards, has been driving me towards independence.
(50:20):
And I do come from this kindof overbearing family, which I'm delighted to
be part of. And I've gota great education, and I had a
fantastic childhood. But for me,finding my own identity and my own success
was a little bit difficult. Sofor me, spending time in China,
where people would never dream of connectingme to my family legacy, I was
(50:45):
just a foreigner who happened to speakChinese, was so liberating for me.
And even though I do, youknow, I sacked the deck a little
bit because I did choose my timein China very kind of just positively for
me. Really, I walked intosuccess in China, really did. But
I have to say my time inChina gave me the illusion that what I
(51:07):
what I built there was me,wasn't my legacy, wasn't somebody else,
was nepotism. And that's really helpfulbecause people can smell this, whether you
can stand on your own two feetor not. So I think this gave
me a lot of the courage ofdoing what I'm doing today. Yes,
one hundred percent, stand on yourgo there. You're your own person,
starting from scratch, and you builtit. Love that. Thank you.
(51:30):
Tony, thank you to bs.Phenomenal conversation. I wish it could go
longer. Maybe we'll do a parttoo soon, but do keep us informed.
The last question is how do peoplesay there of the Peter tal Ilk
out there and they have money andthey want to invest or get involved or
learn more. What's the easiest wayto connect with you, guys? Go
to our website pH dot com,P I E. C h dot com,
(51:52):
so there's bound to be something therewhere you can wiggle yourself through.
Otherwise, you have a first namedot last name at pH dot com and
that's that's our email addresses, soyou you will get dot P at pH
dot com. That's the one that'sthe one all my name dot So it's
(52:14):
always the same, like a corporatestructure. Yes, dot something at something
beautiful And Michael, it's not atrivial thing that you're asking you, right,
because what we're doing is something thatis a mission that we would hope
that people who both like to makea good deal and be part of something
that they believe in with some otherpeople. Is a tribal thing that that
(52:37):
this is how you create momentum.And this is the same as if you
work together with people. Then ifit is investors, then if it is
clients. It only works if peoplebelieve in this thing. Hey, gentlemen,
thank you again for your time thisevening. Really I think it's time
for a beer over there and onthis side of the on this side of
(52:58):
the ocean. So thank you again, gentlemen. Best of luck in this
magnificent endeavor. I can feel thevibe, I can feel the energy.
I know you're going to be abig success. Thank you, thank you,
Thank you so much, Michael.We're trying hard, all right,
talk to you. History shows usthat the very best entrepreneurs set audacious out
(53:27):
their goals, then they get afterhim. Here are three takeaways from our
conversation today. One, piic Automotiveis building a product to meet a need.
That's good news. There are alot of people out there who are
hungry for an electric car that getstheir heart racing beyond those first four seconds
of acceleration. That's the key.Two. I love the story of how
(53:50):
Tony captured the attention and then laterthe confidence of Peter Thiel, planning,
persistence, guts luck, it's allthere. And three, the one open
question is Tesla has the company moreor less served its purpose after totally disrupting
the legacy automakers, or will therebe more pulse racing surprises yet? From
(54:10):
Elon Muskin co Hey, look,building a car company from scratch is a
monumental endeavor. Building the world's bestelectric sports car is stratospheric, like something
like I don't know planning to colonizeMars. This is what makes the PC
automotive story so fascinating and what makesme want to see Tony and Tobs and
(54:34):
their team succeed beyond their wildest dreams. Hey, thank you everybody for listening
to this episode. I am MichaelDunn and this is the Driving with Done
podcast where you meet the experts creatingthe technology that will power tomorrow's cars electric
autonomous software. To find this isa Driving with Done podcast. Thank you
(54:59):
for joining the this episode of theDriving with Done podcast. To connect with
Michael Donn, visit Doninsights dot comor find Michael on x or LinkedIn.
This is the Driving With Done Podcast
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com