Lifestyle
Why do people compare Fisker to Tesla?
On my way back from a great Memorial Day weekend trip to Mystic, CT for some “lobstah”, we played tag with a Fisker Karma with NY plates. We got to see the front, back and sides of the car in all it’s glory, and I must say it’s a pretty smart looking car aside from the plain backside. I knew that Fisker had gone bankrupt and the defunct battery startup A123 which supplies batteries to the car had been bought by a Chinese billionaire, but other than that I didn’t know much about the car or the company. So, while driving back my wife started started googling and reading the information to me. 
The Fisker
The first question we had while peering at the car through our peripheral visions was how the Fisker driver managed to make its way up here from NY? The answer is that while wikipedia calls the Fisker Karma an electric vehicle, it’s really a hybrid. There’s a whole area of research and writing on hybrids that I won’t get into. The interesting part is around terminology. If you run only on electric and use gas to power an electric generator, then how can you get by calling the vehicle an EV when you’re burning gas most of the time. Who are they fooling?
Sometimes EVs are actually hybrids.
There are two “fill” ports on the Fisker, one for electric and one for gas which we saw on both sides of the car. With gas the Karma gets about 20 MPG, and with electric the EPA rates it at a relatively-low 52 MPGe. The electric range according to the EPA is a paltry 32 miles (the Model S EPA rating is almost 10x that at 300 miles). Also, unless you’re a a bit nuts you can’t achieve EPA ranges which require driving on perfectly flat roads at 55 MPH. With these kinds of specs I’d call the Fisker “barely electric”. When you combine both the gas and electric range of the car the full range was 230 miles. So even though you’re burning gas you’re going to have to stop every 100 miles or so to fill up. The Karma is neither a very efficient gas car, nor a particularly good “EV”. What ultimately turned me off from purchasing a hybrid is the fact that the cargo/interior room is compromised by having to support two power systems. On the Fisker this was so pronounced that it got rated as a subcompact by the EPA. The Fisker’s interior was modern and different but more alone the lines of an evolution rather than a radical departure of technological advances and innovation like the Model S.
ASLO SEE: Is Tesla Motors disruptive or disturbing?
The Fisker had a solar panel on its roof which they claimed could gain up to 4-5 miles of extra range a week (if it was really sunny, all the time). Of course they gave up things like a panoramic sunroof for that benefit and the Tesla forums are full of people doing math showing that adding solar to the roof of a car just doesn’t make sense given the small return you can get. But, when you only have 32 miles of EV range, 4-5 extra miles is a huge percentage improvement.
I think the solar roof was really just a sales gimmick to make people think the car was green.
The Fisker had a sound generator that triggered automatically at speeds less than 25 MPH when running in pure EV mode to warn pedestrians of its approach. There are times in the Model S where it would be great to have some button you could trigger to make an obvious-but-not-rude sound. I’ve already been stranded behind slowly walking pedestrians that didn’t know I was following them in my Model S with the only option being a rude horn. Reports say the Fisker Karma can go from 0-60 in 5.9 seconds putting it in the same performance category as the Tesla Model S 60 and slower than the 85 and P85 versions. The Karma was also expensive with a starting price around $102K and going up to $116K, putting it in the class of the Porsche Panamera and the Tesla Model S.
Fisker The Company
Fisker, like Tesla, was a high tech startup company, but unlike Tesla, they chose to use another startup’s battery technology to power the vehicle instead of going with a dominant brand in battery technology.
MUST SEE: Panasonic and Tesla Reach Agreement to Expand Supply of Automotive-Grade Battery Cells
Tesla chose to put 7,000+ time-proven Panasonic batteries in their Model S and upcoming Model X. I’m a big believer in startup companies that innovate and don’t bet their success on the success of another startup. That rarely ever works out well. It should be mentioned that early in the life of Tesla Motors the founder of Fisker actually worked for Tesla and later split off to start Fisker Automative amid lawsuits and controversy. Both Fisker and Tesla took green-energy loans from the government. Fisker borrowed $529M and never paid it back. Tesla borrowed $465M and repaid it in full and ahead of schedule. Fisker started shipping cars to customers in 2011 and got to just south of 2,500 cars before going out of business in 2013. During that time they were plagued with battery problems, reports of car fires and other issues. Tesla has shipped over 40,000 cars so far, admittedly not without their own exciting events along the way. Both Fisker and A123 have been purchased by a Chinese billionaire who hopes to revive the two companies, but given all the compromises above it seems unlikely that it will go well, but alas, there’s no stock to short there.
Tesla and Fisker Similarities?
The Tesla Model S and the Fisker Karma were both built by high tech startups in California but the companies took very different paths to producing green vehicles. Fisker focussed on design with an award-winning exterior but joined it with a mediocre powertrain configuration plagued by supplier and design issues. Tesla focussed on the engineering aspects of the car, using proven technology and making it better while still holding to a clean exterior design. The Fisker Karma is overly complex. It’s also slower and more expensive than the Model S. It has less range than the Model S, even with a gas-powered generator onboard. It is full of compromises like interior space and is not surprisingly no longer produced. It does however have a noise maker and better cup holders.
Summary
As Toyota has proven, hybrid vehicles can be tremendously successful if done right. The challenge is understanding the mission and staying true to that mission. Toyota set out to improve MPG for the masses by using hybrid technology in reaction to rising gas prices. Fisker set out to make a great looking car and only really thought cleanly on aesthetics but made a lot of compromises in execution. Tesla set out to make a true electric vehicle with no compromises and they are accomplishing that mission. Tesla has yet to reach the mass-market level of their aspirations but they are well on their way and already have a true electric vehicle that makes no compromises. For what it’s worth we made the 150 mile round trip to Mystic, CT with 100 miles of range left at the end. While we passed the only Supercharger nearby on the way down and back in Rhode Island, there was no reason to stop and it’s a lot more convenient to charge at home. I’ve made no compromises with my Model S.
Elon Musk
The Boring Company just doubled its tunneling power in Nashville
The Boring Company’s Prufrock MB2 is commissioned and ready to mine beneath Nashville’s streets.
The Boring Company’s second tunnel boring machine, Prufrock MB2, is officially ready to dig in Nashville. The company confirmed the news on X, posting: “Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here. Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start? And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August!”
MB2 arrives with meaningful improvements over its predecessor. Lessons learned from the launch and operation of MB1 have already been applied to MB2 to improve efficiency and prepare the machine for launch.
Traditional tunnel boring machines operate in a stop-and-go cycle, digging roughly five feet, halt, erect precast concrete segments to line the tunnel wall, then resume. That repeated interruption is one of the main reasons conventional tunneling is slow and expensive. Prufrock is designed to install the tunnel liner simultaneously with mining, eliminating the need to stop every five feet. The machine also skips the need for excavated launch pits. Prufrock arrives on a truck, tilts down, and launches into the ground within 24 hours. And when the tunnel is complete, it emerges from the ground and drives to its next launch site on a trailer, eliminating the need for expensive cranes or pit excavation. The machine is also fully electric and runs with zero people in the tunnel during normal operations, controlled remotely from a surface operations center.
Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here.
Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start?
And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August! pic.twitter.com/TTrMql2aRg
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) June 17, 2026
It won’t be long before we hear of another major update on The Boring Company’s Music City Loop project – a planned underground transit network beneath Nashville that would move passengers in electric vehicles through a series of tunnels at highway speeds, and bypassing surface traffic entirely. Nashville was selected in part because of its strong rock conditions that suits the Prufrock machines well, and relatively less regulatory hurdles.
Progress has been steady on multiple fronts. All 37 permits and approvals required ahead of tunneling have been obtained, out of 45 total. Key wins include a fully executed TDOT tunnel permit authorizing 25 miles of tunnel, unanimous airport authority approval for a Nashville International Airport station, and the city’s first residential station agreement serving downtown tower residents.
With MB1 already tunneling, MB2 now commissioned, and MB3 shipping in August, Nashville is becoming something of a live proving ground for scaled tunnel boring. The broader ambition is not limited to one city. The Boring Company’s stated goal is to make underground transportation a practical alternative to surface roads across major metro areas. Nashville is one of many cities, including a successful Las Vegas tunnel system, where that idea is being put to the test at real speed.
Investor's Corner
Tesla unfolded its first European “folding Supercharger”
Tesla’s folding Supercharger just arrived in Europe and it changes how fast charging expands.
Tesla’s Folding Unit Supercharger has officially landed in Europe, with the company teasing a new installation in its effort for a broader rollout targeting major motorway rest stops across the European continent in Q3 2026. The arrival marks a notable shift in how Tesla is thinking about network expansion, moving from hardware performance alone to engineering the logistics chain itself.
While Tesla did not reveal the exact location for the new folding Supercharger in Europe, the photo shared on X heavily suggests that this maybe somewhere in Norway. Historically, whenever Tesla rolls out an entirely new infrastructure architecture in Europe, whether it was the original Supercharger stalls years ago or these brand-new modular V4 “Folding Units”, Norway is almost always the designated launch pad because of its unmatched EV adoption rate and supportive infrastructure
The Folding Unit, introduced in March 2026, is a factory pre-assembled V4 charging station built on an industrial hinge system mounted to a heavy-duty concrete base. The entire assembly arrives on site ready to unfold and connect. Tesla confirmed the units feature telescopic light poles specifically designed for easy transportation and fast on-site deployment, a detail that signals how carefully the logistics chain has been engineered alongside the hardware itself. The design allows 33% more stalls per delivery truck, cuts installation time roughly in half, and reduces overall deployment costs by more than 20% compared to traditional installations.
Tesla’s newest “Folding V4 Superchargers” are key to its most aggressive expansion yet
Tesla also noted telescopic light poles which provide benefits over traditional Supercharger installations that require fixed-height poles that are awkward to ship, slow to position on site, and often require separate crews and equipment to erect before charging hardware can even be staged. By engineering poles that compress for transit and extend on arrival, Tesla has removed one of the quieter bottlenecks in the physical deployment process. Every hour saved on a light pole installation is an hour redirected toward getting stalls energized. At scale, across dozens of new sites per quarter, those hours add up to a meaningful acceleration in how quickly a location goes from approved permit to serving its first customer.
Each Folding Unit pairs a single V4 power cabinet with eight charging posts. The V4 cabinet delivers up to 500 kW per stall for passenger vehicles and up to 1.2 MW for the Tesla Semi, supporting twice the stalls per cabinet at three times the power density of its predecessor. Longer cables make every new station immediately usable by non-Tesla vehicles, a priority as Tesla continues opening its network to Ford, GM, Rivian, Hyundai, Stellantis, and others.
As Teslarati reported when the Folding Unit was first unveiled, Tesla’s Gigafactory New York produced its final V3 Supercharger cabinet in March 2026 after more than seven years and 15,000 units, completing a full pivot to V4 production. The European arrival of the folding design is the next chapter in that transition.
Faster and cheaper deployment means Tesla can justify building in markets and corridors that were previously too expensive to serve, filling the coverage gaps that have slowed EV adoption outside major urban centers.
First Folding Unit Superchargers in Europe 🇪🇺 https://t.co/KNfYWJukkL pic.twitter.com/YR1udIpH1i
— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) June 10, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceXAI just launched into your kitchen with their new app
SpaceXAI just powered its first consumer app and it predicts what you want to buy.
SpaceXAI just made its first move into consumer AI, and it involves your grocery cart. On June 3, 2026, Gopuff and SpaceXAI announced the launch of Go, a Grok-powered shopping assistant built directly into the Gopuff app that predicts what you need before you even start searching for it.
Gopuff is an instant delivery platform that operates more than 400 micro-fulfillment centers across the U.S., delivering everyday essentials, snacks, drinks, and household items in as little as 15 minutes. It is not a restaurant delivery app or a marketplace. It owns its inventory, controls its warehouses, and handles its own logistics, which means it has built one of the most detailed consumer behavior datasets in retail over its 13-year history.
Go combines SpaceXAI’s advanced reasoning, voice, and image generation models with Gopuff’s dataset of hundreds of millions of orders and real-time cultural signals from X to prepare a suggested cart the moment a customer opens the app. It learns each shopper’s habits and automatically builds a personalized cart based on time of day, location, order history, and real-time indicators. Returning customers can check out with a single tap.
Rather than searching for specific items, users can describe a situation like a game-day party or the desire for a healthy breakfast and Go will assemble a cart automatically. It can also predict when shoppers are running low on items like coffee or paper towels and have them packed and delivered in under 15 minutes. Grok voice integration lets users talk to the app in plain conversational language and check out completely hands-free.
Gopuff co-founder and co-CEO Yakir Gola said: “Today, we believe the greatest friction left in commerce is not delivery or instantaneous access to the essentials customers need. It’s the moment before: the thinking, the deciding, the remembering. We’re combining Gopuff’s demand intelligence with xAI’s frontier reasoning to create an everyday shopping experience that feels like a true extension of you.”
Why SpaceX just made a $60 billion bet on AI coding ahead of historic IPO
The timing carries context beyond the product launch. SpaceXAI was formed after SpaceX completed an all-stock merger with Elon Musk’s xAI earlier this year, folding one of the most advanced AI labs in the world into the same corporate structure as the company preparing what could be the largest IPO in history. SpaceXAI is dipping into consumer-focused AI just as it prepares for its public debut, and while Musk has openly discussed building an everything app, this launch uses Grok to power another company’s product rather than launching a standalone consumer platform. Every consumer-facing deployment of Grok ahead of the IPO roadshow adds tangible evidence that SpaceXAI is not just an infrastructure play but a direct competitor in the AI application layer where OpenAI and Google are already fighting for dominance.
Tesla faces Full Self-Driving pushback in EU over ‘speeding’
Tesla teases greater Grok FSD integration and ‘Banish’ feature ‘in about 3 months’
