Nikola was founded in 2014 by Trevor Milton. The startup got its name Nikola as a tribute to the famous inventor Nikola Tesla. It was an American startup that was built to make a change. The change for the betterment of the people and society. They wanted to change the future of the world by focusing on clean environment.
They tried to build trucks which were electric or were hydrogen powered instead of diesel. This was something which could have made a difference in the environment. The people liked the idea and even saw it as the Tesla of trucks.
Their aims:
• To make trucks that run on clean energy using electricity or hydrogen.
• To build Eco friendly trucks.
• Environment stays clean.
The Beginning of the Buzz
It had one vision to electrify the truck industry. Nikola was mostly not seen much until June 2020 when it merged with a SPAC named VectolQ. This was the move which created its hype during its debut days itself. Eventually, its valuation reached $30 billion and this was when none of their product was launched.
Huge promises were made by Trevor like to build a complete network of hydrogen stations so that truck drivers could refill easily. He even have talked about a fancy pickup truck that was to compete with Tesla’s Cybertruck. All this sounds just awesome. But was all of it a reality?
The Video That Broke The Illusion
In 2020, a financial research group named as Hindenburg Research published a report which called Nikola a fraud. Even the promo video of their truck was fake which means means all the big talks were also fake.
Further in 2022, after all the research he was found guilty and was sentenced to 4 years of prison. All the promises made were false and the investors were in shock. So something which could have been a huge startup was actually all fraud. This is a sign that all that we see is not real, there can be someone who can scam you by making you dream big.
From Cash Burn to Bankruptcy
The cash they had in the following years:
By 2023 – $464 million
By 2024 – $198 million
By 2025 – $47 million
A huge decrease in money has been observed during these years which states that how money was being spent and additionally they had a debt of $10 billion. In 2025, Nikola finally filled for bankruptcy.
In order to get rid of their debt they even sold of every bit of what they had through a court led process. They also said that customer support services will only provided till March 2025.
From Nikola to Nowhere
The vision Nikola had was outstanding but only if they could implement it nicely. They started with a bang but ended up being scammers. One must not only build trust but also implement it. This was not just the startup which failed, but it was the startup which a huge downfall.
