ANDERSON, Ind. -- Detroit's chaos and America's summer bout with $4-a-gallon gasoline have opened the way for a wave of automotive innovators like John Waters.
Primed to revive the state's ailing auto economy, the former General Motors engineer is the chief executive officer of
Bright Automotive, an obscure Anderson startup whose 20 employees are busy on one job: creating a car company.
Led by Chrysler, GM and Delphi veterans, Bright is designing a 100-mile-per-gallon light truck assisted by electric power stored on the vehicle in a massive lithium-ion battery recharged from a wall socket. The goal: Get an assembly line going by 2012 for mass production of a high-tech truck known as a plug-in hybrid.