Jan 17 (Reuters) - The U.S. auto safety regulator closed

its probe into 6,971 Fisker Ocean SUVs on Friday over

inadvertent activation of the automatic emergency braking

system, as it does not expect to get further information from

the bankrupt EV maker.

Fisker filed for bankruptcy protection in June, citing a

hyper-competitive EV market and operational challenges that hurt

its ability to stem cash burn and raise additional funds.

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said

the company's employees it was in touch with said late last

month that all of the startup's workers had been dismissed.

"The closing of this investigation does not constitute a

finding by NHTSA that a safety-related defect does not exist,"

the regulator said, but it has no new information to take the

probe further.

The regulator said it had received complaints alleging the

automatic emergency braking system was triggered without an

obstacle in the vehicle's path, resulting in the car suddenly

slowing down or coming to a halt, risking a crash.

Fisker has recalled thousands of its vehicles to resolve

other issues, however, it has not taken a similar action to fix

the issue related to this probe.

(Reporting by Akash Sriram in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini

Ganguli)