Geeta Gupta-Fisker Takes On Elon Musk For EV Leadership

In little more than five years, the Indian-born entrepreneur Geeta Gupta-Fisker, 47, and her 58-year-old American-Danish husband, Henrik Fisker, have raised more than $1 billion of funding and driven their electric vehicle (EV) venture onto the US stock market, Robert Watts reported for The Times of London.

Photo Insert: Geeta Gupta Fisker has been married to auto designer and entrepreneur Henrik Fisker since 2012.

Fisker Inc. has certainly made the California-based couple very wealthy and the pair is now in a battle for market share with Elon Musk’s Tesla — it’s a tantalizing tussle, not least because Musk and Fisker have a previous tussle when Tesla hired Henrik Fisker in 2007 on a design contract.

Geeta Gupta-Fisker herself is now worth £1.2 billion and is No. 149 in the wealth list. Gupta-Fisker and husband Henrik are taking on the electric car mogul Elon Musk.

Their Fisker Ocean electric SUV, due to appear on US and European roads later this year, will cost British buyers from £34,990. Last year the couple met the Pope at the Vatican to discuss an eco-friendly Popemobile.

Gupta-Fisker, who was born in India, has joint British and American citizenship. She came to the UK to study for her master’s degree at the University of Kent at Canterbury, completing her biotechnology doctorate at Cambridge in 2001 and holding a prestigious postdoctoral Newton research fellowship there in 2004.

“We are number one in design. There is no other automaker that produces better-looking cars. Henrik comes with a great reputation for engineering and designing. We were first. We were the world’s first to launch the first premium luxury hybrid, even one year ahead of Tesla Motors Model S. That takes a lot of learning. It took failing. We learned what to do and what not to do. We take those learnings and apply them to a very mature supply chain,” Gupta Fisker explained.

Fisker Inc. has a supply chain that is available to launch a very successful assets-light disruptive business model.

“We work with Foxconn and Magna, who know how to manufacture. We don’t want to reinvent the wheel. They know volume. We do what we’re best at design and product. We know where not to take risks,” says Gupta Fisker.

“We sell directly to customers. Our customers can access us through the app. It is a connected car. We can give our consumers unique features because we are using technology from phenomenal partners.”

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