The start of the German solar electric car Sono Motors gets the top manager of Nissan

05.07.2018

The self-manager Thomas Hausch pbades to Sono Motors
Starting the solar car Sono angers Nissan top manager

The founders of Sono Motors started in the garage of their parents when they were teenagers. The youngest electric car manufacturer in Germany is experiencing fast growth today. Less than a year after the presentation of his Sion solar electric car, Sono Motors brings in an experienced car manager: Thomas Hausch, Nissan's European General Manager until the end of 2017, now joins the management of Sono. As COO, Hausch will implement Sonos' business strategies, as the start-up announced. He is also responsible for managing Sono's strategic partners and suppliers.

The 52-year-old Hausch has dozens years of experience in the automotive industry. From mid-2013 to the end of 2017, he was CEO of Nissan Center Europe, leading the European activities of the Japanese automaker. Prior to joining Nissan, he worked at Daimler and for several years in the United States for Chrysler. From August 2011 to April 2013, he led the sales and marketing of Californian start-up electric cars Coda Automotive, which went bankrupt shortly after the release of Hausch.

Hausch is considered an advocate of electromobility. Since its inception in 2016, Sono Motors was founded in 2016 by Laurin Hahn, a 22-year-old electrical engineering student, Jona Christians, student in Older Ans Navina Pernsteiner, who studied communication design.

The vision of the young founders is to build an affordable electric car, covered with solar panels all around and recharge while standing. Since 2012, Hahn and the Christians have been pursuing their idea of ​​an electric car. As the two had not even finished high school and were working in the Christian garage, they were in a first electric car.

All of this may sound like "Jugend forscht", but the young sono The founders have come a long way with unusual ideas in a short time. In order to fund the construction of a prototype, they launched a successful crowdfunding campaign and started relatively quickly with external investors. In 2017, for example, the medium-sized car provider Böllinger Group and the founder of energy service provider Juvi joined Sono as investors.

More than 6000 pre-orders are already available

In August 2017, Sono presented for the first time in Munich a prototype of its solar car Sion – in which the young start-up has done a lot different from the traditional car manufacturers. Thus, the four-seater car is covered with 7.5 square meters of solar cells, which ideally provide enough electricity per day for 30 kilometers per day. Inside a fine Moosfilter attachment, the Sion car battery can be controlled by a Schuko plug and an electric grill – or charge another Sono vehicle. With a charged battery, the car travels 250 kilometers – and at a reasonable price. For the launch of Sion on the market in 2019, including battery only about 20,000 euros cost.

See also: Sun drives the cheap solar car from Sono Motors

The car needs 5,000 pre-orders to build in series, announced the founding team a year ago. This goal has been achieved by the manufacturers of Sono Motors. According to Sono, there are currently more than 6,000 vehicle bookings. The pre-sponsors had to pay at least 500 euros. Several hundred of them have already paid the total price of 16,000 euros, said the co-founder of Sono Hahn in an interview with manager-magazin.de