Without a doubt, despite its financial woes, Faraday Future is still able to attract only the best for its team. Case in point – the hiring in February this year of Stefan Krause, the former Chief Financial Officer of BMW and Deutsche Bank. Krause was brought on board to straighten up the EV car company’s finances.
On Monday, according to Bloomberg, Faraday Future announced they had managed to grab the likes of BMW’s head of EVs, Ulrich Kranz, as their new Chief Technology Officer, from under the nose of the German luxury car giant.
Kranz has had an illustrious career with BMW, a good part of it as the head of its Project i electric vehicle team. Now, as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Faraday Future, he will be tasked with bringing the FF91, a 1,050-horsepower concept car to reality amid concerns about the shaky finances of a top investor, LeEco founder Jia Yueting.
According to Tech Crunch, Kranz will become a new lead for Faraday Future’s research and development, manufacturing, engineering and purchasing operations. And even though it may be a questionable hire, considering the shaky ground that Faraday Future is standing on right now, it is also considered a strategic business move.
“I’m not a job hopper,” Kranz said in a phone interview with Bloomberg. “Some people will probably raise eyebrows” in reaction to the departure from BMW, the engineer said. “But people who know me well know that I can take risks. I’ve always jumped into projects.”
Yes, Faraday Future’s FF91 is one heck of an impressive vehicle, and according to the company, they still plan on starting production in 2018, even though they don’t have an assembly plant or the money to build one. They have been taking $5,000 refundable deposits for the FF91, sight unseen.
