Self proclaimed next generation American car company, Local Motors, from Massachusetts has announced design student Sangho Kim’s Rally Fighter concept will be the first Local Motors Design Concept to be built.
Touting a new low cost way of building cars, the community based Local Motors proposes a micro-factory paradigm to implement a national network of retail locations each capable of manufacturing, sales, and service of their community created designs.
Whether this micro-factory plan materializes remains to be seen, but Local Motors has taken a step forward with this announcement, which see's Sangho Kim receive a prize of $10,000.
Next up, a team of engineers and master machinists from Local Motors will take Kim's Rally Fighter design and layer it onto a universal chassis.
According to Local Motors' plan, the prototype will be transferred to a network of suppliers who will deliver the necessary components direct to the Local Motors facility.
Local Motors wants to produce 2000 units per year up to a target price of $50,000.
Local Motors Announces First Car to be Built with Community Support
Sangho Kim’s Rally Fighter will be the first Local Motors Design Concept to be taken from sketch to reality. Multiple factors influenced the decision to build Sangho’s design. Community support, focus on car enthusiasts, timeliness and community collaboration are key.
Local Motors will build the Rally Fighter with the participation of the entire Local Motors Community of designers and car enthusiasts, who were the largest consideration in this decision. Ben Messmer, Lead Designer at Local Motors explains the value in Community Design Process, “This design has aroused incredible feedback and collaboration from the Community. By promoting discussion and collaboration early on, we are able to design cars we know people want; there is no guessing.” Everyone is welcome to collaborate and give feedback since the Rally Fighter is currently in “Process”. Kim’s Rally Fighter represents an industry first as the premier car to be designed and built for car enthusiasts in open non-private development.
Local Motors is a new American car company focused on building cars for the most influential market, car enthusiasts. The Rally Fighter will fulfill the desires of these selective drivers:
1. American Authenticity: Local Motors will hold true to the influences of traditional American car design: hotrods, trucks, and aerospace are among the inspiration to build a legion of new and exciting cars for enthusiasts. The Rally Fighter reflects the heroism of American aerospace design and is inspired by the long, powerful lines of Classic Warbirds.
Each Local Motors car will be uniquely American since each is designed and built to suit a local region. The Rally Fighter design is suited to several local geographic areas, from the Baja landscape of Southern California to the hills of Texas and the Back Country of North Carolina. Local Motors has yet to announce the location of the first local micro-factory facility where the Off-Road Rally Fighter will be built. The prototype will be built at Local Motors headquarters.
2. Mechanicals Showing: Die-hard car enthusiasts are turned on by the site of a beautiful automobile; especially if the mechanicals are showing. Styling cues like exposed wheels or exhaust, or exposed panels on frames are details that can take a design from like to lust. The aerospace influence of the Rally Fighter is tailored for features like raw panels you see on old Warbirds.
3. Presence of Excellence: Local Motors’ consistent Presence of Excellence will be head turning, heart pounding car design. What Local Motors will do well with design and execution will be simple but effective. This company cannot and does not intend to compete with other industry products that distinguish themselves on the absence of defects. No matter the price point, no matter the limitations, the absence of defects without the Presence of Excellence is still falling short. In this case, the Presence of Excellence is a must-have design, where we will accept being bested on life cycle testing for door handle reliability (e.g.) in order to focus on a product whose look and feel you cannot live without.
4. Playing (vs. Posing): Car enthusiasts want a vehicle to do what is advertised or implied. A true rally car must be able to jump, and a hotrod had better be able to burn rubber. Anything less is just posing; Local Motors Rally Fighter is ready to play.
This Rally Fighter fits the bill of Local Motors’ and car enthusiasts’ expectations, and we believe Sangho has presented it at the perfect time since OEMs are no longer focusing on large vehicles. As the majors change their product mix away from larger vehicles to achieve overall corporate gains in fuel efficiency, they are creating opportunities to provide larger lighter-weight cars to the American consumer. “We believe there is a way to make a bigger, safer vehicle which is lightweight and super efficient. With the guidance of our community, we not only think but we know there is demand for such a vehicle. Sangho’s Rally Fighter is the clear standout in this category and we are proud to make this design our premier,” says Local Motors CEO, Jay Rogers.
Sangho Kim’s winning creation has spent weeks in the Design Process section refining its unique off-road rally characteristics with the help of the Community. This section of http://www.local-motors.com is a development hub for the most promising Local Motors designs and is invite-only. In this designated area, designers can work directly with the LM Design Team while collaborating with one another. After weeks in Process with the LM Design Team and Community, the Rally Fighter is an eye-catching rendition of aeronautical inspiration in a high-waisted coupe style vehicle.
Kim’s community participation made him an easy choice; not only can he design, but he has excellent communication skills and is able rapidly to iterate his design based on community feedback. Recently, this same skill set helped him win the Miami Road Racer Competition. Now Sangho Kim has taken the opportunity to see his idea come to life, the dream of every car designer. In addition to this awesome experience, Sangho earned $10,000USD. The team at Local Motors will carry out Sangho’s vision and ensure his name will forever be associated with his design. He is only the first of many designers to be conferred with such an honor, and we so Local Motors looks forward to more to come in the future. In addition to Kim, there are already three winning designers and several runner-up finishers who have risen to the top of the community in Local Motors competitions. These other designers’ individual achievements represent the depth of this community.
Local Motors revolutionary but simple process values the desires of community; the community is also the customer.
About Local Motors
Local Motors Mission
Lead the next generation of automotive manufacturing, design, and technology in order to revolutionize the industry with game-changing efficient vehicles and an unprecedented standard of customer service.
Core Values
Must-Have Products: With an aggressive pursuit of both form and function, build and source the most eye-catching, gut pleasing and functional products for personal mobility. This differentiation will command a higher price.
Community and Education: Dealerships are plentiful and customers abound but true communities of owners are precious. From the physical world to the virtual world, treasure the company, the people, and the products that give our owners reason to make friends for life. For our owners, this is not just about transportation; it is about how they enjoy their freedom. A deeper relationship with customers may not increase the price, because while it increases the customer willingness to pay, it also increases the company willingness to share value, but a deeper relationship does increase resale value and brand loyalty. A great part of this value is wrapped in education and the desire of Local Motors to lead the field of auto makers in taking the time to educate and inform its customers in a most engaging process.
Environmental & Corporate Sustainability
Environmental Sustainability: Reduce harmful particulate and carbon emissions. Clean up the face of mainstreet by doing away with the oceans of unsold cars baking in sun. Reduce engine noise inside and outside the vehicle for the sake of serenity. With a must-have product that commands consistently superior value pricing and a community that creates customer loyalty, self-sustaining profit is the result.
Corporate Sustainability: With a must-have product that commands consistently superior value pricing and a community that creates customer loyalty, self-sustaining profit is the result.
Safety: Provide not just a defensive safer vehicle that can withstand greater impact than other vehicles in its class, but also an offensive safer vehicle whose nimbleness and technology make it an industry leader at avoiding accidents.
Seductive Simplicity: Everything you dreamt of, nothing extra.
Customer First: This is the second largest purchase most people ever make in their lives. Treat them with the respect that their purchase deserves. Delight and exceed customer expectations. Pay for this with operational efficiencies born from a local manufacturing, sales, and service model. This has never been done before in the car industry so look for peers from other industry leaders (motorcycles, aircraft, component cars, beer). We are looking for an aspirational product delivered through a meaningful entertainment experience.
To learn more go to: http://www.local-motors.com/aboutUs.php
If this were really a next-generation car company, wouldn't they be making a decision to go-ahead with a new model on more than a couple sketches that aren't drawn the same way twice?
hmm, this company could very easily get a nickname for itself... loco motors? you'd have to be crazy to buy one :P But as to the concept. The world needs more offroad sports cars!
Again these sketches. Look at that ridiculous morphology and side windows. About 100.000 portfolios filled with things like this hanging around the web. Design as an very exclusive and hardiest art by his nature is just replaced by cartoon idioticy.
You must be retarded. You've never seen an industrial sketch before? They must be exxagerated to emphasize the uniqueness and characteristics of the design. Obviously the production version's not going look like that. It will be much more practical, but man get your facts straight before you bash the works of others.
They predict building 2000 units at $50.000 USD?? Are they insane? As much as I love cars (save for BMWs recent idiocy to hopefully end soon with their ugly facelifts), this one I will just drive by the stealership to laugh and gawk at this abomination. This design steals a lot from the British design. I see more of a mutated Aston Martin, than an original idea.
Boos and hisses to this...thing. I wish America would be more original yet realistic in their ideas for newer and better looking vehicles.
You can see the progression from the initial design to the current stage, and participate in future iteration. Your comments and suggestions are welcome, but make them count and put it on the site: www.local-motors.com, where you can interact directly with designers.
As the market moves away from SUVs in the US, what makes you think this will make it? The design by far is not even remotely pleasing to look at, which means this...thing...better perform and not break apart. In addition, $50.000 USD is not a good price for this thing either.
I still voice the negative yet fitting opinions from others in this post. Make this thing a automobile, without the idiotic large wheels and blatant copy off the BMW X6 and Aston Martin, remove the SUV aspects, and you may have a winner. Better yet, do not reward that person the $10.000 USD. If he can design a better automobile that is not an SUV or direct rip-off of the BMW X6 (or any BMW) or the Aston Martin, and looks feasable and fitting for the $50.000 USD price tag, then I will cheer. Right now, nothing but jeers mate. But at least your company is exploring avenues to break the lame-duck American car designs.
I really appreciate your honesty; this is valuable. We have received some polarizing responses to the Rally Fighter Sketch, and I can not say I am surprised or disappointed.
Part of the beauty and the difficulty is that the design is still in process. The fact that you can participate and shape the outcome of the Rally Fighter is an industry first!
It is very nice to see a car company so willing to hear/find the voice of it's critics/admirers. Like I said before, a offroad 2 door mid engined sports car would be freakin awesome! Also, thanks for the link to your site, I will check it out.
Thanks, Joe! You'll have to sign on and say your piece about the doors. I think you'll get your offroad sports car, and it plans to be a real rally jumper... but, I think they might be playing with the idea of suicide doors if they can get the split line to look right. What would you think of that?
hmm suicide doors? that might be interesting. My only concern for regular suicide doors is the whole spinning around while getting into the vehicle thing. What might be even more interesting is suicide/lambo doors. Just so that when you are parked in a cramped space it's easier to get in, and you can still enter sideways not from a forward angle. Also from the side view it looks like it might be easier to get it to fold up at a 60ish degree angle backwards.
I understand that what you are doing is an industry first, but it could be an industry last. There can never be the perfect car (unless you are Porsche) that fits the price with the design and technology put into the car. Many opinions will lead to no results. Even if you go by consensus, it still matters little to nothing.
One great suggestion, since we have your indulgence on this page, is to possibly have a design contest that would look more contemporary and feasable. We all like those spiffy futuristic cars, but let's be honest and consider safety, performance, repairing, reliability, etc. I do not see much in that SUV thing in any of the categories mentioned. Might as well stick rocket engines and missle launchers on that SUV, with possibly dual laser cannons and hope the next science fiction movie picks it up to showcase.
Remove the grotesque wheels, the horrid body design, suicide doors, and start from zero. Remember, you want to sell this thing for $50.000 USD (Ackk!!!!). And you aim to build 2000 units per year. Make it worth buying and make it worth people opening dealerships for it.
do you actually expect this car's final version to look like this? Most major automotive companies have super futuristic renders such as this one. By the time any car makes it to market most of them have been brought down to a feasible reasonable level. Though the tires/wheels on the final version of this car may not be as big as this, they hopefully will be larger then your average car and have still have plenty of ground clearance to make this a serious off roading sports car.
Though I am a huge advocate of the RF (full disclosure, obviously), I have to be honest and open to the idea that it is not going to be for everyone. It is NOT an SUV, excuse my captions but if you look at the estimated dimensions it is clearly a wide stance sports car style body. The canopy is too low to be near SUV proportions. An off-road coupe of this stature has not yet been done, but it is hot (there's that advocacy) and functional in theory. Lower center of gravity plus excellent ground clearance and a wide stance = a climbing, jumping, rally good time.
As you said, Joe, some things may change - many times the wheels in initial sketches appear bigger than they will be in actuality, but the scale and aerospace influence of the RF will set it apart and in our minds these characteristics must remain in tact. We do expect it to look like this, but you will notice that we did not distribute a front view since it is still in process and not yet settled. The ground clearance is key as well since this car must be able to perform; we are not in the business of posing. We FULLY understand that our very survival lies in our ability to deliver head turning design that does what it's advertised to do.
The end result waits to be seen, but even if I knew I still wouldn't tell you (but I don't!) - the fun in this is the process and, for the first time, it is open and available for you to chime in.
Nurchus, huge props for calling out Porche, the 917 is among my personal favorites. Safety, performance and reliability are key and we will continue to earn your trust on these fronts. If you want to help design the next competition, I am all ears. I really think we should talk about it. aferreira@local-motors.com
M, LM does bring to mind Le Mans now that you say it. This was not intentional but now that you mention it, it's not a bad thing. I think you will see "LM" on the cars, but in casual conversation the company is referred to as "Local"; that should provide an easy distinction.
You know, funny you should mention Porsche 917K. It was one of my most favorite cars as well, especially since reading on its history. Heck, it was once considered to put the Porsche 912 (VW engine) into that car. I see we share a car we like from Porsche.
You know, reading your company's profile is almost like looking into Ferdinand's history when he was starting up Porsche. To quote him, "I wanted a dream car. I couldn't find one so I built one myself." I see some hints in that with Local Motors. However, what made Porsche great? Not public opinion. No public polling. Nothing. He just had a passion for making a car perform, be affordable (though Porsche today is crapping all over the good Dr.'s dream), and above all, satisfy a person's desires as his car did for him. Better yet, not only were his cars greatly original, but they were practical. They were not ghastly futuristic, though some elements of thoughts that went into those cars were way ahead of their time. And another thing that Porsche used to coin in their phrase (translated) "The most beautiful line between two points is a curve." That design looks like it is going all over the place.
Joe_Limon: I understand what you are saying and I used to be an engineer myself in my college years, before I went into computer science for more of a challenge. Though now I regret making that move since I loved creating things from scratch. However, even disregarding those ghastly wheels, I still cannot overlook that horrid design. Even trying to make the look more sensicle, it still does not look right. The flow of the design is not balanced. Worse yet, it is not original.
It has elements from BMW heavily, and a lot of wicked beautiful British elements. I do not see anything that was thought up from a blank slate. Yes I understand car companies, especially the Japanese, always take ideas from other cars, but in terms of what Local Motors is trying to accomplish, I think that person should not have won the $10.000 USD. I think more exposure to the world, perhaps a more advertised contest sent out all over the world would have given Local Motors some much better designs. I just cannot look at these sketches and try to make sense of it. Shrinking the wheels, shortening the bonnet or enlarging it, etc, the car makes no sense at all. And reading that Ariel says this is supposed to be a car and not an SUV, sure says a lot. I am sure many others who saw these pictures would have immediately assumed an SUV or a Crossover SUV, before reading Ariel's post.
Ariel, I would love to share some ideas with you. I will try my best to email you some thoughts once I have better organized my thoughts and arguments.
Again, I sound very harsh, but at the same time, I don't want to see a new car company, especially an American car company, repeat the same mistakes that a lot of the more established American car companies have made, and soon BMW if they continue this path of retardedly ugly cars and facelifts.
Nurchus, I appreciate your thought and passion here. You are obviously a car enthusiast who has been paying attention to not only design but the entire automotive industry for a while now. I do not think you're being harsh and if you are, I can handle it!
The success of our customer-first, open-door development remains to be seen. It is, at the very least, interesting. When considering our successful predecessors, like Porsche, I can see why you question our desire to include everyone on the process. Any single designer could potentially design an amazing car (in theory, obviously there are some talent variables here). But, it would be a greater task for us to walk into the automotive arena and aim to be exactly like the rest, tight-lipped and secretive, hoping to design the next great car. There are many coach builders doing just this and while some are pretty good they lack a community. This is our other reason for doing things this way. Yes, we want to build cars people want and give the chance to critique during the development process, and we also want to create a community, the direct connection with the customer - and this is what many companies lack and may be the reason many companies (like the ones you mentioned) are a bit out of touch.
Still, this does not change the fact that you do not like the RF, and that's ok. But I value your strong opinions and I hope the process alone will intrigue you. Someday we will have a design you love and we will desire someone like you to protect and promote it!
One problem with being a small manufacturer in the automobile industry is your reputation stems from the first product you get to market. If I understand correctly, you aim to manufacture community-designed cars; vehicles that ideally suit the lifestyle of large groups of people -- an automotive incarnation of Dr Seuss's Thneed. This is tricky business, since, as is explained in the video, the larger the percentage of people that like product X, the less they like it on average; whereas the smaller the percentage of people who like product Y on average like it much more. Malcolm Gladwell considers Starbucks and McDonald's coffee to demonstrate this point. By the same measure, the Toyota Camry is a wonderfully capable automobile, but is as exciting as a pair of grey socks; in contrast, the RF is an exciting rally-inspired sports car that will never sell as well as the Camry. Is this a bad thing? Not really. RF owners will adore it.
In a moment I will check out Local Motor's website to understand more completely the precise nature of your ambitions. It may turn out you're fully aware of the issue I'm bringing to your attention, in which case, I do apologize for wasting your time. =P If not, in the meantime, I suggest it may be prudent for your company to undertake a second project to offset the negative reactions to the RF. An EV sports wagon, perhaps? That would be something to see!
At any rate, this is an exciting dynamic you are imposing on the industry, and exactly the sort of business innovation that made the United States the economic powerhouse that it is.
PS How about creating a Wikipedia entry for yourself?
Very nicely put Bremen. Much more articulate than what I wrote.
However, I think the reason why car companies are very tight lipped on their new vehicles is because they want to avoid other companies from seeing what the company is coming out with, so they can plan a better design in the future. Some companies camoflage their vehicles well, some don't. It is not because they want to be secretive because they could care less about the afficianadoes out there, but more to protect themselves from releasing a flop. That is one major danger your company may face. Plus remaining secretive is not all that bad either. It can be the difference from a fresh look, to a look everyone has seen time and time again and could care less if the car is released anymore.
There are a lot of tiny things in the industry that must be adhered to, just to make sure you guys swim and not sink on release day. I really like what you folks are doing and I wish you all the best. But some great lessons can be learned by your predecessors, especially why they keep stuff hush-hush.
That was excellent, and a new video for me. I appreciate this quote from Gladwell, "By embracing the diversity of Human Beings, you will find a true way to happiness".
Thank you for the concise and effective synopsis. You're right; we aim to please the few, not the many.
I hope those who read this thread will realize that the RF is just the beginning. One thing not mentioned here yet is that Local Motors will satisfy the needs and desires of car enthusiasts in specific local areas. The Rally Fighter is not meant for New York City, it is designed thus far for a place like Southern California, North Carolina or Texas; for dunes, mountains and rolling hills! Gladwell would be proud.
We have yet to announce our first Local Motors facility. As the location of the facility is announced, the target market is introduced. Changes will be made to the RF to reflect this very specific group of enthusiast drivers.
I will create a Wikipedia entry directly and appreciate the suggestion. I think it is a good time to create an entry for the RF as well.
I like the idea of an EV sports wagon! I hope you will chime in to the Design Process on LM.
Nurchus, I understand what you're saying. The shock and awe of a new design is fun, if it is an exciting new design. Since we can't have it both ways, we will try something new. We will focus on a key group of people, and we will give them what they want :o)
Some people are really quick to criticize whatever they see...Constructive criticism leads to better results all the way through from ideas to final productions. I congratulate the efforts, new ideas and designs of LM no matter how shocking they might be to some. At least they've (LM) taken the first steps towards creating something, whereas OTHER people hasn't shown THEIR designs, but keep criticizing non-stop like there's no tomorrow...and Ariel I give you props for your patience over some of these comments.
