Wheego Electric Cars Fade From Market; China Is The Future, Company Says

With hundreds of thousands of plug-in electric cars from established automakers (and Tesla) on North American roads, most earlier startup carmakers have now largely faded away.

One is Wheego Electric Cars, which took the same approach as Coda: Adapt a Chinese-built vehicle with a battery pack and electric running gear installed in the U.S.

Wheego is still around, it turns out--unlike the defunct Coda--but it's no longer selling cars.

DON'T MISS: 2011 Wheego Whip LiFe Electric Car: First Drive Report (Nov 2010)

A statement from Susan Nicholson, Wheego's vice president for electronics, said:

We are not making the Whip or LiFe any more, but still support and service the cars. We are working on two new models which will first be introduced in China, followed a few years later by introduction to the U.S. market.

Until that time, Wheego is now gone from electric-car buyers' radars.

Last time we checked in, in May 2013, Wheego's two-seat low-speed Whip neighborhood electric vehicle and highway-capable LiFe--the same car with a larger battery and more powerful motor--were both still on sale.

The previous August, the LiFe had been granted a second set of safety exemptions by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

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Those allowed it to sell the LiFe despite the lack of an Electronic Stability Control (ESC) system. It also used only simple airbags, not more modern advanced designs that deploy at different strengths depending on the seat occupant's size and weight.

Wheego's 2013 plans to import a second model from China, a compact crossover utility vehicle that would target a far larger market segment, never panned out.

Its 25 dealers in 15 U.S. states were said to be excited about the new model, but their hopes were dashed.

In the beginning, Wheego hoped to be the first maker to launch a modern, mass-priced electric car into the U.S. market. It was not to be.

The company shipped its first highway-capable LiFe electric car on Earth Day 2011, four month after the first Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt went on sale.