Wheego Whip LiFe EV could beat Leaf, Volt, others to market

As of right now, we know that the Nissan Leaf will make its debut this fall joining the Tesla Roadster as the only publicly available highway-capable battery-electric cars in the the land, a point that Nissan is clearly proud of. But, if things play out just right and all of the pieces fall into place, Atlanta-based Wheego could beat Nissan to the punch and deliver an electric vehicle (EV) by August. We'll admit that a lot has to happen to make this a reality, but we're wondering if Nissan is at least losing a few microseconds of sleep over it.

The car in question is the Wheego Whip LiFe, a highway-capable EV with a target price of $33,500. Here's the problem though, Wheego is short on cash (imagine that) and needs to sell equity to come up with $5 million soon. The funds will hopefully go towards getting the Whip Life through crash testing (if it can pass) and what's left over will go into producing the first 200 cars which could roll of the line as early as August. As Wheego chief executive officer Mike McQuary told BNET, "We were a risky proposition three years ago, but now we're on the home stretch." The company may be closing in on its goals, but there's still a lot of "ifs" and "buts" to overcome. In the meantime, the Nissan Leaf is ready to go.

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[Source: BNET]