The insolvent solar car developer Sono Motors has found an investor after all. The New York hedge fund Yorkville is ready to give the Munich-based company enough money to keep it working until at least the end of next year, Sono said on Monday.
The ongoing insolvency proceedings could be lifted in January if the money flows as expected. Sono will now try to bring back the workforce who were laid off at the end of October. The vast majority are already back on board, it said in a statement. “A completely new management team” should manage the restart. It is unclear who will be part of the new Sono leadership. An SEC filing by the company shows that the new members of the management and supervisory board have yet to be named. All that is known is that the current head of technology, Jan Schiermeister, will be part of the future management.
At least it seems clear that the two founders Jona Christians (30) and Laurin Hahn (29) have no future at Sono. According to the SEC filing, they have agreed to transfer, upon request, a portion of their common stock to a trustee appointed for the benefit of creditors and to new management. In addition, the duo should transfer all voting shares to the future management team.
Sono Motors had a checkered history ran into severe financial difficulties at the end of 2022
. A reservation campaign was supposed to save the Sion solar car. However, of the 100 million euros, commitments were only received for around half. The company then moved away from building a solar powered car. Around 300 employees were to be laid off as a result, as the Munich company announced at the end of February. The manager responsible for operational business, Thomas Hausch, also resigned from his position. “Given the ongoing instability of the financial markets, we were unable to convince investors to invest in a capital-intensive hardware product,” said co-founder Hahn at the time.
Sono then wanted to continue to exist as a solar cell supplier for buses, refrigerated trailers or cars from other manufacturers. The Munich-based company works with Mitsubishi Europe, among others, on their solar roofs for buses Volkswagen-subsidiaries Scania and MAN together. From then on, discussions with potential investors focused exclusively on this, but were unsuccessful for a long time. The company filed for self-administration bankruptcy in mid-May, and all remaining employees were laid off at the end of October.
With the entry of Yorkville, Sono is still living for the time being. In addition to Sono, the hedge fund also seems to be targeting struggling mobility companies, examples include the start-ups Canoo and Faraday Future. In October, Yorkville had an agreement to potentially join Vietnamese electric car manufacturer Vinfast
attracted attention.