RE: TVR seeks £25m investment to secure future
Discussion
rockin said:
So, let's keep this simple. Did that engine destroy the company?
A. Yes?
B. No?
The Speed 6, well that and the V8, which is still one of the most wonderful things, 'when'. TVR were a bunch who seemed to find the more difficult ways to do most things. Bespoke control boxes, unfathomable controls and a well documented cash flow issue. I spoke once to one prominent dealer and a car that arrived on a transporter was actually seized, it had failed on the testing but, well, it had to go A. Yes?
B. No?
But, this was the late 80's, early 90's. I can't imagine what the original Griffith must have looked like at the car show, it's still such a pretty car. It's not, and tbh was never a serious sports car, but it encompassed everything that anyone with an ounce of red blood in them would surely want. Fast, character, simple. And an evocative MD who smoked like a trooper and didn't actually give a toss.
It's tragic they are gone. The Speed 12, Sagaris, Griffith, Cerbera....all of them. In fact, I remember evo testing a load of cars when I was in Japan and on the monumentally expensive import copy there was a CD. IIRC it was Baker who absolutely loved the car, it was on smaller wheels and was one of the cheaper options.
What they did, and how they did it was masterly. So forgive me if some nobody on the internet starts to pick both a business and the owners (who have always seemed like total gents) apart, because the f
king car they decided to buy wasn't what they expected, and not a Lotus 
Edited by ddom on Tuesday 30th June 23:17
rockin said:
ddom said:
IIRC it was one of, if not the highest output I6 fitted to a production car at the time?
Of course they had shortcomings, but someone in this thread just bought the wrong car, well that's tough. It's not the car that's the issue, it is one of an individual not doing his homework
So, let's keep this simple. Did that engine destroy the company?Of course they had shortcomings, but someone in this thread just bought the wrong car, well that's tough. It's not the car that's the issue, it is one of an individual not doing his homework
A. Yes?
B. No?
But there’s no doubt that the S6 trouble hastened the demise.
It’s a shame because the S6 was a good design. But someone, somewhere decided to down-spec components.
It was an audacious thing for a tiny company to make it’s own engines and they almost pulled it off.
With supercharged S6 versions in the pipeline they would not have been short of performance going forward.
Edited by swisstoni on Wednesday 1st July 09:13
Mr Tidy said:
Well McLaren seem to have managed to get £150 Million of funding yesterday.
So perhaps TVRs ability (or otherwise) to find £25m is a reflection of how investors value the business!
I think anybody with a few million to invest would look at McLaren and TVR and think, one exists and one doesn't, one is building world leading supercars, one has built a single mule which has had a lot of criticism, one has probably the best car factory ever built for building cars and doing development work, one has a big shed with a leaky roof, one has a full blown F1 race team, and the offshoots from that, one has a couple of stickers on a Le Man racer, one has thousands of skilled employees, one has eight? unpaid directors, one already has some very rich foreign investors, one has LE, and the list goes on.So perhaps TVRs ability (or otherwise) to find £25m is a reflection of how investors value the business!
Decisions, decisions.Both are a risk for investors, but one has a little bit of a head start.
Monkeylegend said:
Decisions, decisions.Both are a risk for investors, but one has a little bit of a head start.
And of course Aston Martin has the begging bowl out at the moment, too.Equus said:
Monkeylegend said:
Decisions, decisions.Both are a risk for investors, but one has a little bit of a head start.
And of course Aston Martin has the begging bowl out at the moment, too.
ducnick said:
Well the money spent with Cosworth getting 500bhp out of the gen2 coyote was wasted.... Ford has replaced the gen2 coyote with the gen3 that kicks out 480bhp in top spec. TVR could have just bought that off the shelf and saved a few quid on tuning.
Should have stuck to a basic low tech fibreglass sports car with a crate SBC and sold them at £45k-55k in an attempt to capture the buyers of Mustangs and such like who can't afford a Carrera new and don't want to risk big bills on used exotica. A bit of a poor mans Morgan. Not the fastest or best handling thing out there, but visually dramatic, simple to maintain, light, cheap enough to be a toy for middle England and good fun.
100% agree. They needed to have a product targeted at low price point by keeping it simple... Such a shame....Should have stuck to a basic low tech fibreglass sports car with a crate SBC and sold them at £45k-55k in an attempt to capture the buyers of Mustangs and such like who can't afford a Carrera new and don't want to risk big bills on used exotica. A bit of a poor mans Morgan. Not the fastest or best handling thing out there, but visually dramatic, simple to maintain, light, cheap enough to be a toy for middle England and good fun.
unsprung said:
Pete Mac said:
I suppose my other comment is that if TVR have such a great relationship with Ford (as the article implies) then why aren't they seeking finance/issuing shares to Ford to whom £25m. must be chicken feed despite their own issues or perhaps Ford are also questioning the viability of this venture......
The TVR company hopes to become a cash-and-carry customer of crate engines sold by Ford. You, and almost any person or organisation in the world (apart from those in Iran, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria), can decide to purchase a crate engine from Ford.
There is no relationship or partnership between TVR and Ford.
ddom said:
I’d love to know what the general feelings are of those with deposits. IIRC when I enquired they were fully refundable?
With or without funding, will the deposits tip the balance?
I would think that a ‘full order book’ was going to be used as part of the case to gain the real finance required.With or without funding, will the deposits tip the balance?
I don’t think the deposits themselves were ever going to matter one way or another towards actual funding.
ddom said:
IIRC when I enquired they were fully refundable?
Here ya go, from their website,"Is my deposit refundable?
"Yes, until you place your formal order (once specifications and options have been announced), you will be able to apply for a refund. All we ask is that if you place a deposit, you do so in good faith.
"Is my money at risk?
"No – we would never allow that to be the case. We are well funded, and are here to stay! The deposit line has opened in response to a large number of requests from potential customers wishing to place a deposit on the basis of the information currently available both in the motoring press and on our website. If you do not consider this to be sufficient for you to decide whether or not you should place a deposit, we recommend you do not do so. However, if you pay by credit card, your payment is guaranteed by the credit card company."
Not exactly reassuring. It doesn't say you'll get a refund, just that you can apply for one - with Mr Barclaycard hopefully picking up the tab if it all goes tits-up. Potential buyers would need to have £5,000 of spend available on their credit card to get off the starting blocks.
Don1 said:
P-Jay said:
Well... the silver lining here is that when it all ends in tears the WAG will have only sunk £2m into it, a lot less than the £9m+ it sunk into the Circuit of Wales.
I'm really tempted to take a walk down to the Senedd next week with my best Straw Boater to tell them about this great idea I've got for a Monorail. All I'll need is a catchy tune and a business plan written in pure fiction and they'll award me (or rather my freshly registered Limited Company) millions of pounds to 'invest' in creating a bit of buzz in the media, I'll probably squeeze a bit more out of them a year later before the final Coup d'état, a very public begging letter or "opportunity to invest" in a venture that could't possibly succeed.
But main street's all cracked and broken! I'm really tempted to take a walk down to the Senedd next week with my best Straw Boater to tell them about this great idea I've got for a Monorail. All I'll need is a catchy tune and a business plan written in pure fiction and they'll award me (or rather my freshly registered Limited Company) millions of pounds to 'invest' in creating a bit of buzz in the media, I'll probably squeeze a bit more out of them a year later before the final Coup d'état, a very public begging letter or "opportunity to invest" in a venture that could't possibly succeed.
CS Garth said:
Pro Bono said:
It's `interesting' that they're launching the bonds in Dublin, presumably in the belief that the Irish enjoy a flutter!
.
Or possibly because they’re all on craic .
With this framework in place they can now target the funds which invest into debt at this level. That market has been dormant since Feb but is slowly beginning to wake up.
You won’t get investment from the auto side as that is pointing 100% to EVs and not will you get anything via London as that is a herd which only follows the trend, which is EVs. TVR, like other sports cars will go EV but the battery tech is a long way from yet suiting the sports car application. So hybrid would be the next step to be urban complaint and also allow for smaller engines etc.
Anyway, you’d expect the bond to start being filled after the summer, assuming the world slowly gets back to work and looking forward. Once the bond is half filled then I think you’ll see things like the factory moving forward and the pre production program well under way.
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