Heroes in Business - Henrik Fisker the iconic automotive designer is interviewed by David Cogan of the Eliances

Episode Date: April 12, 2024

Henrik Fisker the iconic automotive designer is interviewed by David Cogan of the Eliances Heroes radio show amfm. Fisker discusses car design and how inspiration comes from sketching and thinking about what he wants to see on the road. Fisker is a real creator, entrepreneur, innovator, mentor, and brand ambassador that has designed such iconic cars and James Bond style Ashton Martins, BMWs, V8 Vantage, Fisker Karma, Viking Motorcycles, Rocket, Destino and Force 1. Passion drives creation of his dream vehicles. He talks about how not all designs work and the difficulty of designing cars. From childhood to now he's always loved cars and wanted to be a designer. True vision and american design school helped him get his start.

Welcome back to Alliances Heroes, where heroes in business align. To be part of our super community and find out more about Alliances, visit www.alliances.com. Now, back to our super host, David Kogan, founder of Alliances. Can you absolutely believe this morning of heroes? I mean, heroes are the ones that know no roadblocks. There's people that say no to them every day, but they keep plugging away and moving forward faster and faster than ever before. I mean, we started off the show, we had the chairman and CEO of the world's largest racing and driving school.

That's right, Skip Barber Racing School. That's right, Skip Barber Racing School. We just had the co-chair of a $1.4 billion business controlling and owning Molly Mae's, Mr. Reuter, so many other brands. That's with Owens Group. And our next hero, oh my gosh, unbelievable. Listen carefully. I want to live vicariously through this gentleman because you won't believe who our next hero is. Talk about being a legend.

He is an entrepreneur. He's a creator, innovator, mentor, brand ambassador, and a leading automotive designer. Certainly, you've heard of some of the cars that he's helped design and build. BMW Z8, Ashton Martin, V8 Vantage, Fisker Karma, that's your tip, Viking Motorcycles, Rocket, Destano V8, Force Rome, drumroll please. That's right, Henrik Fisker, who could be reached at henrikfisker.org. Unbelievable. How in the world, Henrik, do you dream up these automotive marvels? Well, just like you say, when people say no, then you know you have a really good idea. So, you know, for me, it's all about coming up with something new and innovative and really something that I think that I would enjoy myself as well.

But every single one of your designs are absolutely amazing. They're sexy. They're incredible. And when any of them drive down the road, everybody looks. What is the inspiration that you go, well, how do you think of these things? Is it when you sleep? Is it when you look at something and you go, you know what, I can somehow create something that's similar to similar that I mean, what's the secret? Well, you know, I don't know exactly what the secret is other than I sit down and I sketch and and, you know, usually what I do is I think about the type of vehicle I want to do. And once in a while, I'll also have an idea, just like you said, my dream as I drive down my road, something will come into my mind. Like you said, my dream as I drive down my road, something will come into my mind.

And when I get to my office and my drawing board, I'll sketch it out. And sometimes it works, and sometimes it's just a silly idea that you can't really get to work in 3D. I mean, probably one of the most difficult products in the world to design is a car, because as to work in 3D, it's got to have an emotional connection with the consumer, whoever looks at it. And like you say, if you can get people to turn their head, especially people who don't care about cars, I love when somebody, you can see they don't care about cars, but they still turn their head and look at the car I've designed, then you feel really good about it. And we have Henrik Fisker with us. And you led a team of 600 people. You've raised more than a

billion in capital. You took the company from concept to full-scale production with Fisker Karma that sold more than 2,000 vehicles in the first six months of production alone. Under your leadership, it won numerous awards, including Time Magazine Best Inventions of the Year. I mean, you must have just saw that and just been just amazed. At what point in your life, though, did you know that you had this special skill of automotive design? You know, I was just probably like all kids playing with cars, you know, as a child. And, you know, when I started getting into my teenage years, I started thinking about how would I do it? And eventually I said to my dad, you know, I want to be a car designer. And he said, well, go down to your school and tell your, you know, advisor in school.

And she said, I remember, she said, there's nothing called a car designer. You can become an engineer. I said, no, I want to be a car designer. She said, there's nothing called that. So eventually I had to pack my drawings in my old rusty Alfa Romeo and drive from Denmark, where I lived, and flew up down to Switzerland, where there was an American design school called Arts and the College of Design, which is also in Pasadena, California. And I started there, and the rest is history. so much. You were president and CEO of BMW Design Works USA, BMW's California-based industrial design subsidiary, some incredible cars. You designed the Ashton Martin V8 Vantage, which was really, production responsible for the launch design of the DB9, variants of which are James Bond

preferred vehicles. That's why you remind me of James Bond. I mean, you've done some amazing things. Who was your mentor growing up? You know, probably I would say when I got my first job at BMW, there was a gentleman called Klaus Kapitza. And he actually arrived from Ford and his first car he did at BMW was a BMW 8 Series, the 8 Series Coupe. And at that time, that was incredible modern, and I just thought it was really cool. And I learned a lot from him in terms of design. And then generally, I think BMW probably was sort of a mentoring company to grow up in because it's really a company where design and engineering work very

close together and you're allowed to innovate, you're allowed to take risks. We sort of had an internal saying at BMW, it's better to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission. I love it. Excellent, excellent advice. And are you a hero in business? Well, we've got Henrik Fisker here, henrikfisker.org. He's a legend. He's an icon. Well, make sure you go to alliances.com. That's E-L-I-A-N-C-E-S.com. That's right, the place where entrepreneurs align. And you've done so many things in your career.

What do you want to be remembered for most? You know, it's funny because when I design a new car, I always find that's my best design. So I don't think much about being remembered for something specifically. I like to really think that everything I do, I definitely do it with the thought of I want people, at least a certain amount of people, to like what I do. But, you know, when you're an innovator and do something unique, you're always going to be controversial. It's very hard to create something that is very unique unless you're a little controversial. So you will never have everybody like what you do. So I don't have a particular thing. Maybe the fact that I started the car company Fisk Automotive, which I'm very proud of. Very few people obviously have done that and brought a car to the road,

you know, fully certified worldwide. Despite the problems we had with the batteries, I mean, that was obviously a big issue. But when I created Fisk Automotive, every step of the way was like opening a door and not knowing what was behind it because the pioneers would go to suppliers and ask for parts that they never even knew what was. We actually had to tell the suppliers how to make it because nobody had ever done this type of car before. So that was an amazing journey where innovation was part of every single day. And I'm about to do a couple of things like this again,

and it's something I'll never get tired of doing. Henrik, you know you're incredible. Again, the things you create, the things that you can imagine and bring to fruition. What would you say, though, most critical advice you can give to children? You talked about when you were younger playing with cars, children who dream big like yourself, who perhaps right now are playing with their matchbox cars and they want to be a designer. What critical advice can you give to them? I think the biggest advice is that you have to obviously set your dream into motion. So you have to be proactive about it because nobody else can carry out your dream but yourself.

So if you want to be a car designer, you've got to go on the web, find out where the design schools are, perhaps the nearest to you or which one you want to go to. You're going to have to send them a letter or apply for it. You really have to be proactive and make it happen. Specifically, if you want to do something that everybody tells you no to, whether it's a new product idea you have or whether it's a school you want to go to. And most likely, if you go down to your local school, a lot of times they'll probably tell you that, you know, forget to be a car designer because it's very difficult. But you have to pursue it. You have to look at what you need to do to get into the school you want to go to.

And in short, you've got to be proactive. You've got to create your own dream. You're responsible for your own life and your own success. Now, we've got less than 30 seconds here, and I mean, I've got to know for someone. Henrik Fisker, again, you can reach him at henrikfisker.org. Someone who's done so much in their life. What could possibly be on your bucket list, something that you haven't done yet? One day, I want to do a car that almost everybody can afford. I've only really done expensive supercars and sports cars so that's on my bucket list a car most people can afford but it's going to be good looking and

amazing unbelievable put me down as number one on that pre-purchase list henrik fisker a hero is someone who can actually make what they dream appear someone who puts it all on the line to make it come to reality. And that's what our hero today has done. That's the legend, the icon, Henrik Fisker, who can be reached at henrikfisker.org. Thank you again, listeners. David Kogan with Eliance's.