Faraday Future’s quarterly report for its EV factory shows that it moved a lot of dirt – that’s it

Like Governor’s Office of Economic Development (GOED) did for Tesla’s Gigafactory last week, they released the quarterly report for Faraday Future’s own electric vehicle factory project in the state.

As of the last reported quarter (Q4 2016), the company reportedly made a $160 million capital investment in the project, but the only result so far is a lot of dirt being moved around.

Faraday Future and Lucid Motors are seen as the two main startups trying to follow in Tesla’s footsteps in the electric vehicle world. They are promising because unlike legacy automakers, they are not stuck with an internal combustion engine business and they don’t have to worry about cannibalizing their market shares.

But they also both have problems with bringing their vehicles to production. Lucid announced its factory to be built in Arizona, but it has yet to start construction and as for Faraday, while they did start work at their site in North Las Vegas, they don’t have much to show for despite officially “breaking ground” almost a year ago.

After the “breaking ground” ceremony and the unveiling of the details of its $1 billion EV factory back in April 2016, the company completed grading for the “first phase” of its project.

Based on the GOED’s report published this week, here are FF’s accomplishments as of December 31, 2016:

1. Capital Investment of $160,000,000.
2. Completed all site demolition work.
3. Graded and moved over 2.5 million cubic yard of earth on site.
4. Completed installation of the underground sewer.
5. Completed grading with the exception of the north and south channels not required for this phase.
6. Certified that the pad for the factory building is at grade and ready for the start of foundations.
7. Established On-site offices for both Faraday Future employees and the General Contractor.
8. Leased additional interim office and meeting space in the city of North Las Vegas.

As of last month, the company had no permanent buildings or foundations on the location at APEX North Las Vegas industrial park. We asked if anything changed since then and we will update if we get an answer.

FF has been hit by several lawsuits and financial issues over the past few months and some were ready to call it ‘game over’ before the unveiling of their new FF91 concept at CES in January.

It looks like those financial issues are at the center of the slow progress in North Las Vegas. The company’s main backer, Jia Yueting, is a Chinese billionaire and there’s been speculation that government restrictions on moving money outside of China might be an issue in this case.

Jia’s main company, LeEco, is reportedly looking to sell its campus in Silicon Valley, which could free up some cash in the US to finance FF. It could sell for as much as $260 million.

As we recently reported, the company also recently hired former BMW/Deutsche Bank CFO Stefan Krause to straighten up its finances. They released pictures of the new CFO giving a speech to employees this week:

What do you think of FF at this point and its chances of ever bringing a vehicle to market? Let us know in the comment section below.