Fisker is in even more trouble as an engineering partner has sued it for $13 million over unpaid fees and damages
- Fisker is being sued for almost $13 million by a German company that was hired to help engineer the Pear and the Alaska.
- The company, a subsidiary of Bertrandt AG, claims that Fisker stopped paying it in August 2023, and later put the projects on which it was working on hold.
- Fisker describes the lawsuit as being “without merit” and a “disappointing attempt” to extract payments and IP from it.
At this point, it’s no surprise to learn that Fisker is facing financial difficulties, but a new lawsuit from an engineering firm that was working on the as yet unreleased Pear and Alaska models suggest that the embattled automaker’s financial woes stretch as far back as last summer.
Fisker has been sued by a German engineering giant, Bertrandt AG, which, in a lawsuit, says its subsidiary was hired to work on the upcoming Pear, an affordable electric crossover, in 2022. The contract was worth more than $35 million but, in August 2023, the firm stopped receiving payments from the automaker.
Read: Fisker Warns Employees Of Mass Layoffs Within Two Months
Bertrandt claims that Fisker has skipped out on just over $7 million in fees. In addition, the engineering company claims that the automaker’s alleged decision to put development of the Pear and the Alaska on hold (the firm claims it was also supposed to work on the pickup) is a breach of contract that has exposed it to $5.8 million “lost profits, delay costs, and incidental damages.”
In all, Bertrandt is seeking $12,919,443 from Fisker. The German company also says that on April 22, it demanded the safe return of all its intellectual property and that the automaker “certify in writing that Fisker had not retained any hard copies or electronic copies” of its IP, something the EV startup failed to do.
“The lawsuit filed by Bertrandt is without merit,” Matthew DeBord, Fisker’s VP of communications, told TechCrunch. “It is a legally baseless and disappointing attempt by what has been a valued partner to extract from Fisker payments and intellectual property to which Bertrandt has no right to under the relevant agreements or otherwise.”
Bertrandt is just the latest Fisker collaborator to launch a lawsuit against the automaker. In early April, Corinthian Textiles sued the EV startup, claiming it was owed over $1 million in unpaid invoices and other fees from the automaker. Fisker is also being sued by employees over improper compensation.
The automaker is on the brink of bankruptcy, has hired a restructuring officer, and claims that without debt relief it will not be able to continue operating much longer. While Fisker’s troubles became public a few months ago, these lawsuits suggest that the financial woes started earlier than we previously knew.
