Faraday Future Revealed A Rebadged Chinese Minivan In Los Angeles And It Was A Complete Disaster

Despite an extremely tumultuous existence, including reports of potential SEC enforcement just two days ago, Faraday Future is somehow still alive and kicking. The American startup founded by Chinese businessman Jia Yueting had only sold 16 of its $300,000+ FF91 luxury EV as of earlier this year, likely all of which went to investors or celebrity influencers, and I doubt many more (if any) have been sold since then. Earlier this week Faraday Future announced it had secured $105 million in financing to fund the launch of a new model called the FX Super One, the first model in FF’s Faraday X sub-brand.

In the invitation to the FX Super One’s reveal, which I attended on Thursday night, the company described it as “the world’s first AI-powered luxury MPV and a true disruptor in the electric era,” and said the event would also debut “the Super EAI F.A.C.E. (Front AI Communication Ecosystem) and the new FF EAI 6×4 Architecture, which are core to Faraday Future’s new tech and product direction.” In the press release for the FX Super One, the company says it “isn’t just about upgrading ones experience with automobiles — it’s going to redefine it entirely.”

I’ve been to a lot of reveals in my near-decade in this industry, from extravagant ones to sketchy low-budget ones, but I’ve never seen something quite like the FX Super One unveiling. The presentation was almost an hour of utter nonsense, and the car is a rebadged Great Wall Motor minivan with a big screen stuck on the front end for the car’s seemingly useless AI assistant. Faraday Future gave basically no specs or real information about the car, we don’t know when deliveries will start or where it will be built. And the CEO said prospective customers will get to help decide how much it’ll cost. What?

Full disclosure: Faraday Future gave me Uber vouchers to get to and from the event, and had a folding chair reserved for me in the second row of the audience so I could have a great view of this mess.

The reveal was held on the rooftop of ROW DTLA, with an absolutely beautiful view of downtown Los Angeles in the background. There was an array of interesting pastries and snacks that I didn’t try because I was too busy being baffled that the bar was only serving mocktails. I ran into friends of Jalopnik David Tracy, Mack Hogan, Jeff Glucker, Lyn Woodward, and Peter Nelson, so at least I wouldn’t be alone without a cocktail in my hand. Aside from us and a few other journalists I recognized, the crowd was a few hundred influencers and investors, some of whom were definitely paid to be there. 

On a section of the parking garage right after walking into the party, Faraday was giving “dynamic” rides around a cone course in an uncamouflaged FX Super One. I went to take a photo of it and got yelled at, despite there not being any “no photos” signs and having not signed anything agreeing to not take pictures. Whatever. Don’t have the car out in the open before the reveal, then! (Notably, that van they were driving people around in didn’t even have the front screen, which is its main feature.)

Daniel Golson / Jalopnik

They ushered us fancy VIPs to folding chairs with our names on them in front of the stage, where there were two vans under covers and a large screen. Before the presentation really kicked off, a “forward looking statement” disclosure popped up on screen and a Faraday Future spokesperson started talking about how everything we were going to see was still in development and not representative of the final product — and then a second disclosure popped up on screen with a huge wall of disclaimer text, and he kept talking about it. I’ve never seen something like that at a reveal before, and it certainly didn’t instill confidence in what we were about to see.

Speakers from Faraday Future included Jia Yueting, global co-CEO Matthias Aydt, and FX CEO Xiao Ma, but brand ambassadors like race car driver Justin Bell, racer and influencer Lindsay Brewer, and actor and Paul Walker’s brother Cody Walker also got on the mic to speak at different points throughout the presentation. None of them seemed like they really knew how to read a teleprompter or speak properly, and it didn’t seem like anyone actually understood the gobbledygook they were saying. There were mic problems and people talking over each other, and at multiple points it seemed like employees tried to stop the CEO from continuing to speak. It was especially rough to watch the influencers try and seem earnest and excited when discussing how groundbreaking the car is and how much they support the brand.

Daniel Golson / Jalopnik

There was a lot of business talk about how well the company is allegedly doing and how allegedly prepared it is for the future, with discussion of things like “the unique Light 4, Swift 4, Focused 5, and Empowering 5 model of FF’s Global Automotive Industry Bridge Strategy,” and how “FX inherits FF’s spire-level product and tech power, enabling a rapid Blue Ocean + Blockbuster market breakthrough.” Basically every single phrase and sentence had “AI” added on somehow, whether they were talking about the van specifically or the company as a whole, and it was all totally incomprehensible. I didn’t take any real notes because my brain was oozing out of my ears, and I’m definitely not gonna go back and rewatch the livestream, but I recommend you do because it was just so wild.

Finally the covers came off of the two vans on stage so we could finally see what the hell they had been talking about. Well, one of the covers came off. The other cover got stuck, and it took at least five guys to get it off. There were two vans, a black one and a white one, that looked like… normal Toyota Alphard–style vans, except with a giant ugly screen taking up nearly the entire nose. That’s the F.A.C.E., you see, a display for the “Vehicle Embodied Agent” AI assistant that is “a window to perceive, interpret and communicate with the outside world.” The AI assistant “talked” to us and the executives about how it has emotions and a soul, but I have no clue what it actually does, and the screen can’t even be turned on when the car is in motion. It’s cheap and low-res, too; Faraday showed a bunch of different animations on it that all looked like crap.

It was immediately apparent to me that the FX Super One is just a simple rebadge of some existing van, not a bespoke Faraday Future design, and our friend Kevin Williams was the first to point out exactly what van it’s based on. It’s a Wey Gaoshan, an admittedly pretty nice (but certainly not near class-leading) luxury van made by one of Great Wall Motors’ sub-brands that was first revealed in 2023. Aside from the screen, ugly paint-matched trim, stickers on the taillights, and the badges, the FX Super One is identical to the Wey from the outside.

Faraday says the all-wheel-drive FX Super One will be available with fully electric or range-extender hybrid powertrains, the latter of which it calls an “AI Hybrid Extended Range (AIHER).” No, the company didn’t explain how a powertrain could be AI. Currently the Gaoshan is only offered with a traditional plug-in-hybrid setup using a 1.5-liter turbo four paired with two electric motors, so who knows what the FX Super One will actually use.

Tell me if you understand any of what the company is saying in the press release here:

The FF EAI Embodied AI Agent 6×4 architecture is built on pure vision, end-to-end Vision-Language-Action (VLA) and world model. In the simplest terms, 6×4 architecture means there are six tech platforms, powered by the four tech systems. This enables AIEVs to evolve — with soul, personality, intelligence, and emotions — ushering into a new era where EAI EVs become truly intelligent. This year, the entire AI industry hit a major inflection point.

FF AI has been upgraded to the FF EAI platform, leveraging EAI technology to fully empower four major tech systems and six key tech platforms — including applications, OS, hardware, mechanics, cloud, and AI. This makes the Super One not just an intelligent car, but an embodied intelligent lifeform on wheels.

Again, no actual details or specifics or descriptions were given about any of this, just repeated buzzwords. It was absolutely baffling, and went on and on and on at the event. I could try and keep explaining all of the different things they talked about, but I don’t think you want that and I don’t either.

The FX Super One will be available with seven, six, or four seats, but there were only real-life images of the two three-row variants, and that’s what was at the event and shown in the presentation. The second-row “zero gravity” captains chairs do look quite luxurious, with all sorts of recline and extension and massage features, and the choice is between two or three seats in the third row. Faraday showed renderings of the four-seater, which will have even more luxurious seats and a partition with a huge screen, but I’m not confident it’ll exist — the Gaoshan’s four-seat setup looks a bit different, with no large screen. Also, Faraday is calling the four-seater the GOAT Edition, which one of the display cars kept saying on its front screen.

After the presentation was finally over and we were invited to go up and look at the cars, I started looking in the windows, because we hadn’t gotten a glimpse of the dashboard design yet. The windows weren’t tinted, and the white van’s door was even unlocked, but employees quickly tried ushering us away from the windows. I took out my phone to snap some photos and got yelled at by someone on one side of the van. A little bit later I  walked up to the other side of it, and saw a woman snapping a photo through the driver’s window with her camera. When she was done I did the same with my phone, and two guys held up their hands to try and block my lens. Too late dudes, I already snapped it. The FX Super One’s dashboard and center console are identical to the Gaoshan’s.

The company says it has an “EAI OS” that’s smoother than your phone, but gives no specifics as to what the AI systems could actually do. There is said to be Dolby Atmos audio, at least, but no specifics on the sound system. The only real details given are that it has 34 inches of third-row legroom and can fit six golf bags in the trunk.

Right after the covers had been taken off they brought up a QR code on the white van’s screen, which would take you to the pre-order page. It didn’t seem to work very well. The $100 pre-orders are fully refundable, at least. If you’re a stockholder who preorders by July 20 you get extra perks like a $3,500 voucher towards the MSRP, priority delivery, more customization options, an invitation to a members-only Faraday Spire club, an extended warranty, and a “Faraday X Swag Package” with a t-shirt and baseball hat.

As the presentation was wrapping up, Jia Yueting came back on stage to announce that 10,034 “binding deposits for non-binding pre-orders” had already been placed, which included pre-orders they had already collected from B2B and B2C partners — a list of which had been called out on screen and over the mic moments earlier, most of which were different dealerships, rental agencies and marketing firms.

Daniel Golson / Jalopnik

Then, in an absolutely bizarre moment, after Yueting said the MSRP will be announced at the FX Super One’s final launch following appearances at other events like Monterey Car Week later this year, the van’s AI chimes in and says, “why don’t we kick off an MSRP co-creation campaign?” (Faraday calls its owners “co-creators” for some reason.) Yueting replied, saying the van will cost less than an Escalade — but how much less? He then said that customers “can share their thoughts on the ideal price range” on the website and app, and that Faraday will “use your input to help shape the final MSRP.” HUH?

Faraday says its factory in Hanford, California, has an annual production capacity of 30,000 vehicles and a flexible production line, so I’m assuming that’s where the company will build the FX Super One to try and get around China tariffs. The company also has a new R&D facility in the UAE.

As you can probably tell, I don’t think this thing is ever gonna happen. If the FX Super One actually does make it to production, it surely will be in extremely limited numbers, and only to the company’s influencers and those already agreed-upon fleet-ish sales. I don’t think the company is going to last much longer either, especially not after this total flop of a reveal.

I do think that high-end minivans are a potential wellspring of a segment ready to be mined, though, and Faraday Future is right that good ones would be a lot more appealing than a Cadillac Escalade. These luxe vans are hugely popular in Asia and the Middle East already, and the market is growing in Europe. The U.S. is next. Mercedes-Benz will introduce the electric V-Class next year, and I’ve heard rumblings Lexus is exploring bringing the LM to America. In China some of the vans are on a total other level of luxury, including from brands like Buick. We deserve Chinese vans in America, but we absolutely do not deserve this thing.