Going After The Biggest Players In The Game
It’s not that long ago that it seemed a new EV startup was popping up every week. Few of them survived, and fewer still seem to have any prospects of doing so much longer, but one that is hanging on is Faraday Future, and it’s finally announcing (and teasing) new cars for us to speculate about. Right at the start, we should warn you that very little concrete information has been provided, but the few bits of the company’s announcement that are specific are telling. The name of the new car is the FX 4 (part of the Faraday X sub-brand), and the company claims that it will be “the disruptor of RAV4 in the AIEV era.” Going after Tesla and Toyota with one car? That’s going to bring some challenges, but Faraday has others in the works for other uses, too.
What We Can Expect From The FX 4
Only one teaser image of the FX 4 was shared on the company’s website, and nothing is yet being shown on its social media channels, but that won’t remain the case for long. The company intends to unveil the new model’s product plan in Q3 2025, with plans to start accepting pre-orders before the year is out. The company believes the FX 4 is the model “with the greatest potential to become a true blockbuster and unlock the mainstream market within FX’s current lineup.” That, in itself, is an admission that things haven’t gone well with other products, an acknowledgement that for EVs to find success, they have to – at least for now – become much cheaper than something like the FF91, which can carry a base MSRP on the dark side of $300,000. A 2025 Toyota RAV4 costs a tenth of that in base spec ($29,250, excluding destination), and a 2025 Model Y starts less than 20 grand higher in its most expensive form. Faraday’s current base offering, the FX 5, is already targeting a price between $20,000 and $30,000, so the FX 4 – expected to be smaller than the Model Y – could rival the cheapest cars in America if all promises are kept.
But Wait, There’s A Minivan Coming Too
You might not have noticed it yet, but minivans are cool again. We’re not the only ones saying it either; Road and Track recently spoke to Edmunds and found that, not only are the options improving, but more people are buying those options. Faraday, always with an eye on the future (ha), seems to have realized this some time ago, as it’s also planning to bring the FX Super One minivan to market, teased above. That’s one of the prototypes seen below. Another is the aforementioned FX 4, and a third is the FX 6, which is supposed to reach the market with a price tag between $30,000 and $50,000. The label on Faraday’s site only specifically notes those three, and none of the cars in the image below reveal all their features, so we can’t be sure of the last prototype. The fact that four vehicles have been displayed should indicate that significant progress on all of Faraday’s projects is being made. We’ll see what transpires with the FX 4 by the end of September and go from there, but the Tesla Model Y has consistently been a global best-seller, and Toyota’s excellent RAV4 even outsold the beloved Ford F-150 last year, so it’s as tall an order as they get. In addition, Toyota has new EVs of its own on the way. May the best automaker win.
