What happens to a car when the company behind its software goes under?

Imagine turning the key or pressing the start button and nothing happens—not because of a dead battery or a broken engine, but because a server no longer answers. As cars become platforms for software and subscriptions, their ability to function increasingly depends on the survival of the companies that write and maintain that code.

When those companies fail, the impact can go well beyond a bad app update and into whether a vehicle still works at all. Fisker provides a recent example. The Ocean arrived in Britain in May 2023 but the company filed for bankruptcy about a year later; only 419 Oceans reached UK driveways.

One buyer in Southampton experienced persistent software problems, and when engineers arrived to collect the car for repairs it refused to start. Fisker’s insolvency left the vehicle stranded in a driveway for ten months with no clear remedy. An earlier case, Better Place, shows how infrastructure and software can brick vehicles.

United Kingdom, Southampton

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