A closed automobile plant has a certain kind of silence. You get the same impression when you read about what happened to Fisker’s leased space in Southern California or drive by the former Lordstown works in Ohio. By a specific quarter, assembly lines would be humming, according to the press releases. The quarter arrived. There was never a hum in the lines. It’s difficult to avoid thinking about all the renderings—those glossy side-profile pictures of cars that, frequently, no buyer ever took home.
After five years, the damage caused by the 2020–2021 SPAC boom has largely subsided. And what an odd boom it was. A special-purpose acquisition company, which is a quicker and lighter path to the public markets than a traditional IPO, is essentially a pile of money searching for a private company to merge with. The key word is light. Part of the reason so many of them turned out to be promises masquerading as businesses is that the companies using it received far less regulatory scrutiny. After filing for Chapter 11 in February 2025, Nikola—once valued at more than Ford on paper—was delisted a few weeks later. The founder had previously been found guilty of fraud. Without an editor labeling it as heavy-handed, you couldn’t write it as satire.
However, it would be lazy to declare the entire category dead. A few businesses actually constructed things. Lucid Group is the clear example; yes, it has been supported for years by Saudi sovereign funds, but it also produces truly impressive machines that reviewers frequently use the word “engineering” to describe. The numbers reveal a more nuanced picture. Early in 2026, Lucid produced 5,500 cars and delivered just over 3,000, but its Gravity SUV was delayed for almost a month due to a seat-supplier issue. The stock has been penalized, currently trading at less than ten dollars, and the business continues to raise money. Despite the quarter’s disappointment, investors appear to think the technology is real. The question of whether a car company can survive solely on belief has never been satisfactorily addressed.
Then there’s the infrastructure community, which is, in my opinion, neglected. EVgo and ChargePoint do not manufacture automobiles; instead, they manufacture fleet hardware, fast-charging stations, and the messy, capital-intensive plumbing that automobiles rely on. These businesses expanded through grants and business partnerships. less glitzy. Perhaps more resilient. It is not necessary for a charging network to prevail in a style war or persuade people that its founder is telling the truth. All it needs to be is a place where people can connect.
Looking back, there are a few unattractive things that distinguish the living from the dead. The number of quarters a business can continue to burn money before the well runs out is known as its cash runway. units that were delivered to real driveways rather than ones that were “anticipated.” and a way to generate actual income, such as through government contracts or selling regulatory credits to automakers that are still in need of them. Years spent in what one observer memorably described as “prototype and fundraising mode,” perpetually six months from production, was a common characteristic among the unsuccessful ones.
It’s important to keep in mind that Tesla experienced almost the same uncertainty. People tend to forget how close it was and how many analysts dismissed it. The distinction is that Rivian, which completely avoided SPACs and went public the traditional way, has at least produced real trucks and vans that are used on real roads, while Tesla eventually shipped at scale and turned a profit. These days, the distinction between a reverse merger and a traditional IPO almost seems like a character reference.
Thus, the debris remains. A portion of it is rusting. However, a few businesses continued to ship while keeping their noses clean. As you watch this happen, you begin to believe that the lesson had nothing to do with electric cars. It was about the distinction between an effective thing and a story.