Aussie Fast Charger Company Tritium Goes Bust

[EEVblog]

Bummer.

https://reneweconomy.com.au/ev-fast-charger-pioneer-tritium-calls-in-administrators-after-declaring-itself-to-be-insolvent/

[.RC.]

It was aptly named.  Bright to begin with, then faded with time.

[Faringdon]

...Sorry to hear it.....though there will be very many following them down...across the western world. Fact: EVs are a gonna in the west...the only way the west can afford it is if the West buys the cheap Chinese EVs. The Chinese are also withholding/keeping in short supply  some of the chemicals needed to make EV batteries (as below link).
EVs are a gonna in the west...maybe just a small percent will have them. ICE cars are going to be majority for next 100 years at least in the west.
Fact: Soon to come is even more eye opening. In short time virtually all Power electronics products from China will be Banned from western markets.

https://www.gbnews.com/lifestyle/cars/richard-hammond-electric-vehicles-petrol-2050

[floobydust]

It's a terrible happening and important to know really why the venture failed, rather than the old "blame the economy/market" excuse.

Lately I see a lot of green industry companies - top heavy with high-wage executives, going public with the associated high legal, accounting and of course marketing spending - then waiting for the investment bucks, grants to roll in, along with the unicorn. They're not (yet) profitable, high burn rate.
Meanwhile, the one lowly engineer is flogged to make world-class products ASAP. Or they'll just fake it like Nikola or Theranos.
It's all based on overhype, inflated unrealistic sales numbers, overpaid exec's, total focus on marketing, and the assumption that new tech is merely a crop coming in for harvest.

EV bus manufacturer ProTerra goes insolvent, municipalities have $100's million worth of buses that never made their claims for range or reliability in the first place- costing 2x that of a diesel bus, orphaned. The company closes down, all warranty obligations and performance grievances wiped and then it gets bought on the cheap by Phoenix Motor. It seems to be the MBA green business plan. Blame it on a sales downturn, the economy etc. etc. but no, it's really the original business plan was "to the moon" with no ground connection lol.

The green pullback is severe whiplash for these overdone companies I think.
Downturn - Tesla is getting trashed too, laid off 10% or 6,000 staff in California and Texas. Let's just blame the economy, not the Cybertruck fiasco, not the CEO, not the silly expensive products etc.
"Andrew Baglino, the senior vice president of powertrain and energy engineering, said on X that he had made the “difficult decision to move on from Tesla after 18 years”. This a  bad omen.

[quince]

The green pullback is severe whiplash for these overdone companies I think.
Downturn - Tesla is getting trashed too, laid off 10% or 6,000 staff in California and Texas. Let's just blame the economy, not the Cybertruck fiasco, not the CEO, not the silly expensive products etc.
"Andrew Baglino, the senior vice president of powertrain and energy engineering, said on X that he had made the “difficult decision to move on from Tesla after 18 years”. This a  bad omen.

Tesla's stock is up 25% over the past week, though. The layoff was strategically valid.

[floobydust]

I would say that is a blip - down 40% since July and I don't see anyone handling the EV party coming to an abrupt end, well.
Canada we roll ahead blind as a bat, announce new battery plants after billions in subsidies. Meanwhile, BYD is preparing to decimate the low end. Tesla has china BYD nipping at its heels, actually Europe is terrified too of those cheap EV's decimating their car industry and panic adding tariffs to protect it.

But battery chargers, inverters are a technology in power electronics. The chinese are masters of the cheap, short lifetime, race to the bottom vanilla tech, whatever they can copy. Their inverters/chargers are junk and not what people want. I would expect the Tritium products to be decent, reliable and higher tech designs.

I wonder if anyone other than china would buy them and resurrect?

[uer166]

I would expect the Tritium products to be decent, reliable and higher tech designs.

Eehhh as someone who's seen the internals of one I'd slightly disagree. It's a very messy design with a clear lack of integration/vision. Wires everywhere, myriad of interconnects, and a general sub-par design of the assembly. Unimpressive specs, and complete lack of network security at all as well.

They were/are stuck about 15+ years in the past and for whatever reason did not or could not innovate.

If you want reliable and optimal power electronics you'd go with Tesla power electronics.

[Marco]

EV bus manufacturer ProTerra goes insolvent, municipalities have $100's million worth of buses that never made their claims for range or reliability in the first place- costing 2x that of a diesel bus, orphaned. The company closes down, all warranty obligations and performance grievances wiped and then it gets bought on the cheap by Phoenix Motor.

They paid peanuts because they did take over the warranties and a couple 100 employees. Of course if Volvo stops making the drive train they and the customers are still screwed.