Here’s Why Lightyear 0 Production Has Been Halted

• Lightyear halts production of its first model, slated to cost about $260,000, to focus on a more affordable EV planned for 2025.

• The Lightyear 0 is powered by a 61.2-kWh battery, giving it a range of 388 miles in the WLTP cycle, with solar panels integrated into the bodywork designed to give the sedan extra range.

• Valmet Automotive has been producing the electric, partially solar-powered sedan in Finland since the start of December 2022.

The Lightyear 0 promised a solar skin that could give the EV up to 43 miles of range per day, a drag coefficient of 0.175 Cd, and a battery with the highest energy density of any production electric car.

The innovative sedan, six years in the making, was also going to be wildly expensive at a time when automakers are starting to roll out affordable, everyday EVs to take Tesla models head on. The Dutch EV was going to start around $260,000, making it seem like an artifact from the early years of EV debuts.

Despite this obvious market challenge, contract manufacturer Valmet Automotive began production of the sedan in Finland in early December, with a rate of one car per week.

Now, production of the innovative EV has been abruptly halted, with the company calling it a "strategic restructuring." Lightyear indicated that instead it plans to focus its resources on a much more affordable EV planned for 2025.

"In order to safeguard our vision, we had to decide to redirect our focus and resources completely towards Lightyear 2," the company said in a statement. "This means in effect that we had to suspend the production of Lightyear 0."