The thing with deadlines is that they get shorter the more we talk about them. When I first started writing about the Fisker Personal Electric Automotive Revolution – PEAR, in short – it was four years from production lines. Now that the company presented the production-intent prototype, the waiting time was cut in half. For those interested in Fisker's proposition, that's still a lot of time in line for a drive, but they may feel it is worth the wait due to the price and one feature that only a Fiat Multipla offered in more recent times.
If you do not remember the Italian MPV, it was as bashed for its design as it was praised for practicality. The ugliest car in the world used to accommodate six people with only two rows of seats. The trick was using a bench seat in the first row, something Fisker said and disclosed the PEAR will also offer as an option.
That makes a lot of sense. Most electric cars do not have a transmission, so there is no need for a center console for a gear shift. Instead of putting a massive storage area between the now-traditional two seats in the front row, why not put one more person there? At $29,900, the PEAR may be the most affordable car to offer that possibility. Hopefully, it will not be an expensive one.
At 4.55 meters (179.1 inches), the PEAR is much longer than the Multipla (3,99 m, or 157.2 in) but still much shorter than most vehicles for sale in the US. Although it will be manufactured in Ohio in a partnership with Foxconn, this design probably has an eye on markets such as Europe and Latin America.
Photo: Fisker
The PEAR will have two battery pack options, but Fisker did not disclose their capacities. It only mentioned that the entry-level component will offer an estimated EPA range of 180 miles, which turns into 320 kilometers under the WLTP cycle. The company wants it to be "the lightest and most sustainable version." Those in need of more range can select a battery pack with an estimated EPA range of 320 miles – 560 km under WLTP requirements. Fisker did not disclose these battery packs' chemistry or voltage, but it would be great if they used lithium iron phosphate (LFP) and worked at 800V. That would allow them to charge faster than vehicles working at 400V and to be fully charged more frequently without concerns about durability.
The slowest time for the PEAR to go from 0 to 60 mph is 6.3 seconds. To reach 100 kph (62 mph) from zero, it should take 6.8 s. The car will use 20-inch wheels as standard and 22-inch wheels as options. When the buyers prefer the larger wheels, they will come with high-performance tires. By the way, Fisker wants the PEAR also to offer a high-performance derivative: it will be called PEAR Extreme, and it should have the 22-inch wheels as standard, as well as be an AWD vehicle. The affordable PEAR will be RWD.
What Fisker first promoted about the car was the Houdini Trunk, which led me to think it was talking about a sedan back in 2021. This solution makes the rear glass retract inside the trunk lid and this component repeat that in the vehicle's structure. Fisker was quick to clarify that the trunk lid is housed behind the rear bumper beam, which protects the mechanism and the Houdini Trunk should a crash occur.
Photo: Fisker
The PEAR also has a "froot," which is what Fisker calls the drawer in the front of the car that works as a boot. That's how the company escaped naming that solution as Tesla did by calling it a frunk. In Fisker's case, the sliding compartment can be insulated to keep food cold or hot. The idea is also to use it to store stinky workout gear, sparing the occupants' noses of the bad smell.
Fisker promises the PEAR will offer a Lounge Mode, which will create a space for the occupants to watch a movie or rest – probably while waiting for the car to charge. An optional 17.1-inch rotating screen will allow the passengers to watch movies when the vehicle is parked, and the rear seat is folded backward in the trunk area. The front seats can also be folded flat, but that should happen forward. It would be nice if Fisker released a video or pictures of the Lounge Mode for us to have a better idea of how it works.
Photo: Fisker
The PEAR uses a new light steel body structure that its manufacturer did not detail. The only information about the vehicle's construction that Fisker disclosed was that it uses 35% fewer parts than a comparable vehicle and that the cabin will be "extremely durable, with no fragile moving parts – excellent for car-sharing applications, busy families with kids or people who like a lot of storage space everywhere." A quick look at the pictures reminded me of the same hard plastics a Chevrolet Celta had in the 2000s, but only a closer inspection will confirm that.
Another relevant aspect of the new vehicle is the Fisker Blade, a high-performance computer (6.2 TFLOPs) that is also very energy-efficient and upgradeable. Its asymmetric processing architecture allegedly helps it offer 25% more performance per watt. According to Fisker, this car is almost ready for production apart from the "exterior camera mirrors, which are still under review."
The company expects the PEAR to help it create a carbon-neutral vehicle by 2027, but it also did not elaborate on that. We'll have to wait four years to discover what it means, but deadlines get shorter each time we talk about them, remember?
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