It sounds like a crucial Aptera factory is planned to be built in Italy. I have concerns about how resilient Aptera's manufacturing ecosystem will be in the face of tariffs, trade wars, geopolitical tensions and potential supply chain disruptions.

Don't know what to say when people still think labor cost is the key in 2020s when comes to competitiveness. Those who still brag about western company have standards on labor right and believe China got it's edge from sweat shop are truly the ones whose head in the sand.

What's GAAP accounting for when you don't list on US stock market?

good grief! Just do it!!!!!

As long as it gets into production, I am fine with some delays. I do want to see the results of real world testing for efficiency, range and performance. That will give us an idea of how the production EV will perform. I do hope that they can start limited production this year. Even if that means that they build 50 PI models. The moment that they go into limited production it will become far easier to get big funding so that they can ramp up to volume production in 2026.

Will they have one ready for the World Solar Challenge in Australia this year?

Please build the car……soon…..like June 2025…..just saying

Not interested until fast charging since live in apartment with no charging and cannot do road trips. Then why need more then 250 mile battery back with no fast charging?

The phase I am looking forward to is the one where I am pulling out of my driveway in mine.

Not one word about an actual production date.

oh Hell! yes Lets Go Aptera !

I guess technologies are changing a lot now so it’s hard to come up with the latest and best to settle down with final production units?

Does anyone else feel like Aptera lost the plot somewhere along the line? Ok, so its streamlined. Nice! Its got solar. Meh. It has a screen. Meh. It has upholstery. Meh. It has 3 wheels. INTERESTING! See? Its a quirky car and people that like quirky cars will buy it. Not people that care about saving 50 bucks per year on charging. Would I be happy with VDO analog gages like my Lotus 7 replica? F yes. Would I be happy with an off-the-shelf bucket racing seat and a 5 point harness? I'd prefer it! Would I be happy with black Naugahyde interior with some exposed carbon? Sure thing! I'm not a girl that buys a car because it has a flower vase, or a Karen that complains if there's a rattle somewhere, or a bad stitch on the door handle. I just want a weird 3 wheel car because its weird and has 3 wheels. I think thats what they missed and they spent years and millions making this thing seem like a big company's production car, when they are NOT a big company. Its killing me to see them agonize about upholstery and door handles. All this stuff cant be that impossible to make, because I have small-production-run race cars that have this stuff and they're not investing gazillions of dollars. They're over-thinking this and could have been on the road years ago and saved the refinement and white cloth interior for later.

Oh, they're making Deliveries now? Where can I go pick one up?

I'm most looking forward to them going into production. My BIGGEST concern is money. How long can they go before delays into 2026 are inevitable? And how much further can they go before filing for bankruptcy? If they still need most of the $60 million in 6 months for example. I would assume production won't start until well into 2026. If in 12 months they still need the money will they need to file for bankruptcy?

Has anyone looked into using the aptera pv panels for producing household power?

Disappointed I thought they would have at least one complete car but we had a test mule and what amounted to a show/concept car. Still a long way to go.

I bet they are validating right now on that OEM test track.

Would people please stop labelling stuff OEM that is not OEM!? Arrrgh!! It is so frustrating to hear people like Chris Anthony misusing that label. Good stuff otherwise

Just hats pff to all aptera creqto keep pushing and striving to succeed !!! I ll hope 2025 is gonna be the magic year !!! Whatever you do .. make some cars !!!!

I don’t agree with your viewpoint on labor unions. Because of labor unions we find that a large portion of automobile manufacturing was moved out of country. Partly because of greed on behalf of the CEOs. Party because of the cost of doing business. Unions had a time and place. Not so much anymore.

I'm more excited for Aptera's innovative manufacturing than I am for the car itself. This is a different kind of company from the ground up. I'm really excited to see how they fare in the open market. I think they have a winning recipe that other startups are going to copy, but time will tell.

Robots are great for mundane, repetitive tasks and those that require higher speeds or have safety issues. Like driving a car, or flying a plane, not every scenario can be covered by automation. The human factor, for all its inconsistencies, still has a place in many manufacturing and operational jobs. Regarding the job market: even robots require occasional maintenance and exist only because of manufacturers working as a corporate team. These companies still need welders, truckers, warehouse workers, office personnel and others not considered 'techy'. Then there are the part suppliers that enable the robots to be manufactured in the first place and then maintained after purchase. Heck, even local burger places that feed those employees create jobs. It's still a job chain..., but of a different design. Like oil, automation should not be considered the enemy. If used for the right purpose, our lives can be enhanced by its use. Of course I've never seen robots in the break room, other than vending machines. They're not very good conversationalists..., yet.

Some day we will robot all our jobs away, not so far future

The only thing I would like to point out is that much of the car industry in the USA, and to a lesser degree Europe, is highly "robotocized", just not as much as in China. I am sure that the USA and Europe will catch up though

A number of anti-labor overtones which is how company owners have to think to survive

The EU crushed Europe. Sad but true.

Great video! thanks for sharing!!

Even coding may go by the wayside for humans and I am a coder. I still think it is a ways off. Simple programs can be given to AI.

OMG He's got a drawing of a factory. It's not real. Interview someone that builds something.

Sounds like to me that all of this gloom and doom, is going to kill Aptera before they get out of the gate.

Tesla's at the Fremont plant now drive themselves off the assembly line...

I think Steve has it right regarding the use of automation to remove the drudgery of repetitiveness with roboticized tools. The role of labor in the coming decades, one might opine, depends on the success of trump in destroying any sense of equity or entitlement that is not directly tied to a bank account. I think the order of magnitude issue is a greater one in mediating the proper role of labor in the auto plant. In behemoth, vertically integrated mega factories, I can't see workers ever being comfortable working around humanoid robots doing similiar kinds of work. I mean how many games of tipsy robot will they typical a-holes in maintenance play before they break? I mean how sure are we that say .5 % of the population is genetically pre-disposed to kill 'alien' beings and humanoid robots are certainly 'alien' beings. I mean look at the issues we have ... and some have made it an art form to exacerbate racial and even more subtle social or religious differences. Ask yourself right now; is there is any moral impediment in your mental makeup that would make you hesistate from turning off a light switch ... on a humanoid robot ... and physically dismembering it? Will the manufacture of soft and cushy humanoid sexbots change this? Well, first, the obvious, if you have a sex-bot in a factory, you're employees will likely be happier than the average but you probably won't get much work done. Second, like the AI rendering of children in a sexually exploitative poses - i.e. no 'real' children were harmed in this imaginary exercise - the morality of all this is horrifically confused by the more cavilier attitude men have toward their machines. That our attitude toward humanoid robots and robots in general will inevitably change but how it will change is critical. I thought the first part of the discussion was actually a bit more interesting. In it Steve made the remark that going back 2000 years to some historical tome on agricultural practices, that agriculture from its inception has always engaged the notion of an exploited worker class and that the practice of agriculture inherently includes the creation of this fourth-class seat on spaceship earth. The changes that are coming in the way folks relate to each other and to other entities - humanoid robots for instance - will define our life. Robocop.

Its great they want future factories, but as far as I've heard they still need $60M to get cars out of the door from their current facility, whats going on with that? I mean, let's not put the cart in front of the horse.

Future factories while showing a fake video that is 2 years old This company has more history than future

Big union companies like GM are doomed. They owe more money than their total worth!

hello William good to hear of course

good coverage of podcast

aptera is a scam.... check the history of this company over 10 years of nothing but taking money

So while the U.S. average new car is almost $50k, you’re saying the Chinese government is subsidizing $40k per car to dump their cars at $10k each, to the tune of over 5 million cars exported per year? Wow the Chinese must be rich and insane to hand out $200 billion per year!

Hopefully that temperature range is enough. The car is going to get super hot gathering that sunshine and conversely super cold.

Could you do a video about progress towards the first production line?

What is the hold up?

we are waiting patiently

Let’s GO Aptera!!!

As a planet, these are conservative numbers on fossil fuel usage, worldwide, per day: Oil: Approximately 100 million barrels per day. Natural Gas: Around 1.1 billion cubic meters per day. Coal: Roughly 21.9 million tons per day.

I don't think I've ever seen an Onlyfans model advertise on a billboard before.

Japan's auto industry is completely lost and will lose market share to China. They are still wasting time on hydrogen when electric is clearly the future fuel type. Japan is at least 10 years behind in battery tech and will likely never catch up. Expect a lot of bankruptcies or govt bail-outs in Japan as a result

That is far and away the best looking car on the market and probably in the top 10 of all cars ever made. For $35k they're going to sell millions of Apteras. What a great time to be alive!

❤😊 Brilliant bit of engineering. this is the future lightweight aerodynamic plant-based technologies of the future❤ fingers crossed prototypes easy production hell. it's sad that the governments can't give them a hand or tax the toxic fossil ones that are killing our Earth😢❤❤❤