Paul Elio Promises Reg A+ Investors 25 E-series Test Vehicles...

[ElioWallSteet]

Here’s a bit of interesting Elio Motors history...

In 2016...Paul Elio promised his investors that 25 E-series test vehicles would be built with the money raised by selling Reg A+ Elio stock...

Pay attention to the last 60 seconds of this video...

The promised 25 E-series test vehicle were never bulit...I wonder what happened to the money?

 

[booboo]

Here’s a bit of interesting Elio Motors history...

In 2016...Paul Elio promised his investors that 25 E-series test vehicles would be built with the money raised by selling Reg A+ Elio stock...

Pay attention to the last 60 seconds of this video...

The promised 25 E-series test vehicle were never bulit...I wonder what happened to the money?

This is nothing new. I have known basically from the beginning that Paul's vision was to do it big.
The money went where all money goes, into somebody's pockets.
He has said from the beginning it would cost 500 million to get to production, which is about 1/2 of what a big car company spends to roll out a new model.

 

[Carl Sweisthal]

Here’s a bit of interesting Elio Motors history...

In 2016...Paul Elio promised his investors that 25 E-series test vehicles would be built with the money raised by selling Reg A+ Elio stock...

Pay attention to the last 60 seconds of this video...

The promised 25 E-series test vehicle were never bulit...........

 

[Carl Sweisthal]

Pay attention to the last 60 seconds of this video...

The promised 25 E-series test vehicle were never bulit...I wonder what happened to the money?

 

[84mpg]

Beat....... the.......... dead......... horse.........

Yes we know, we know.....

 

[Watashiwah]

Pay attention to the last 60 seconds of this video...

The promised 25 E-series test vehicle were never bulit...I wonder what happened to the money?

Beat....... the.......... dead......... horse.........

Yes we know, we know.....

Carl, your question is, of course, a valid one: most of we long time posters wonder about that. Since Elio Motors is still taking reservations (or whatever they call it now) it is fair to keep the newer folk up on concerns that have never been answered.

Now it looks like EM is going to inherit a whole new audience of interested people, the Overstock.com investors!!

Paul is apparently meeting with the Shreveport people before the Overstock.com Stock Holders Meeting.

The Caddo Commisioners are interested in (primarily grandstanding and posturing) the GM plant’s utilization, but the new Overstock crowd is probably very interested if their ‘new’ money is going to fall into the same hole that you are asking about.

This is certainly an exciting juncture!!

 

[Ty]

Pay attention to the last 60 seconds of this video...

The promised 25 E-series test vehicle were never bulit...I wonder what happened to the money?

When Elio changed from a roll cage design to the stamped steel version (which cost a lot of money to change), building 25 of the old roll cage version cars became very moot. So, simple answer - instead of wasting funds building a version that was not suitable for mass production, Elio spent the money designing molds, having those molds made, and molding the bodies/frames they used in the 5 they built (not all complete, of course). It makes perfectly good sense to me.

 

[84mpg]

Thanks for your explanation Ty.

I imagine the check written to Rousch was substantial in itself.

Rousch was involved in the design switch to stamped - right?

 

[Gregw]

This is nothing new. I have known basically from the beginning that Paul's vision was to do it big.
The money went where all money goes, into somebody's pockets.
He has said from the beginning it would cost 500 million to get to production, which is about 1/2 of what a big car company spends to roll out a new model.

If it takes $500 million to get to production, what good will $2.5 million from Overstock do? Why would they invest such a small amount, seems like just throwing money away. Or am I missing somehing?

 

[RSchneider]

I am not buying the idea that somehow someone came up to them in 2016 and said, "You know it would be lots cheaper to make your car like 99% of every other one on the planet and you did acquire a massive steel stamping operation in 2013." Elio had to have been told that 1000 times from the minute they acquired that plant and 100 times when they didn't have one. They are dealing with the automotive industry and there's a reason why nobody makes a cheap high volume car that's a tube frame and a plastic body, the industry knows exactly what works the cheapest.

I suspect the IPO was to pay for that unibody and hopefully to make the 25 cars because up to that point and even for a short time afterwards, they were still talking all about a tube frame and plastic body. If you look at the R&D costs, they spent $7.4M over two years (2014-2015) yet spent $20M in 2016. Maybe if they actually raised the $25M which they were hoping to do, then this would be a moot point. They needed $12M for the 25 cars which would have left them with $13M to finish the design on the chassis and body. In the end, they made 5 chassis' and no body (Elio still has a fiberglass body). I suspect the reservations would not have kept rolling in if they would have let everyone know in 2013 that the car everyone fell in love with is nothing like what they have planned.

There are two things that I see which Elio should have done since day one:
1. Unibody with a steel body
2. Source one of the dozen off the shelf engines that are in production which meet their needs

I know this is water under the bridge today but it's those kind of decisions which can make your life unnecessarily difficult. Elio really needs a new BoD and someone else at the helm because history has a nasty way of repeating itself.