Fisker Owners Build DIY Software to Save Their Orphaned EVs
About 4,000 Fisker Ocean owners formed a nonprofit to reverse-engineer their cars after the EV maker collapsed.
When your car company dies, you grab a wrench — or in this case, a GitHub repo.
After Fisker Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in June 2024, roughly 11,000 Ocean SUV owners were left with vehicles and no company behind them. No software updates. No support. No roadmap.
Around 4,000 of those owners decided to fix that themselves. They formed a nonprofit dedicated to keeping their cars functional by reverse-engineering Fisker's proprietary software and building open-source replacement tools from scratch.
It's a remarkable act of collective self-preservation. EV owners are uniquely vulnerable when manufacturers fold — modern electric vehicles depend heavily on cloud-connected software for basic functionality. Without it, these cars risk becoming expensive paperweights.
The effort highlights a growing tension in the EV world: who really controls your car when the software isn't yours?