News | Truck
Nikola’s ambitious plans accelerate Nikola’s merger with VectoIQ will accelerate its plans for vehicle design, breaking ground on a manufacturing plant and kick-starting hydrogen station rollout. Nikola Corp.’s recent merger with VectoIQ is expected to help accelerate the company’s technology and business plans.
before vehicles are ready, or vehicles before infrastructure. So, we’re working on that parallel path.”
“Nikola has ambitious plans,” Elizabeth Fretheim, head of business development said. “We’re focused not only on the vehicles – the Badger, of course we have the semi-trucks, we also have a power sports division but then we’re also trying to resolve that ‘chicken-andegg’ question about putting up infrastructure
The new manufacturing plant is slated to break ground in Coolidge, Arizona on 23 July 2020 according to a June 19 tweet from Nikola founder and executive chairman Trevor Milton. ‘The ceremony will be held there to kick off construction of the plant that will build up to 35,000 zero-emission semi-trucks and create thousands of jobs,” he wrote.
Germany, which has since been cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Based on the Iveco S-Way heavy-duty truck, The first units are expected to reach Daimler and the battery-electric Nikola Tre for European customers in 2021. The Tre is the first step was slated to debut in September at toward Nikola’s fuel-cell-electric model, which Volvo to establish markets the IAA 2020 commercial vehicle exhibition in will be available to customers by 2023. joint venture SEA trucks now heading to production for fuel cell in the Latrobe Valley development Daimler Truck and the Volvo Group have signed a preliminary non-binding agreement to establish a new joint venture. The intention is to develop, produce and commercialize fuel cell systems for heavy-duty vehicle applications and other use cases.
SEA electric trucks are now in a consolidation phase according to Joe Di Santo, SEA Electric Sales Director for Australia and New Zealand having moved out of R&D and into production at its Dandenong, Victoria plant.
Daimler will consolidate all its current fuel cell activities in the joint venture. The Volvo Group will acquire 50% in the joint venture for the sum of approximately EUR 0.6 billion on a cash and debt free basis. Volvo Group and Daimler Truck AG will be 50/50 partners in the joint venture, which will operate as an independent and autonomous entity, with Daimler Truck AG and the Volvo Group continuing to be competitors in all other areas of business. Joining forces will decrease development costs for both companies and accelerate the market introduction of fuel cell systems in products used for heavyduty transport and demanding long-haul applications. The common goal is for both companies to offer heavy-duty vehicles with fuel cells for demanding long-haul applications in series production in the second half of the decade. In addition, other automotive and nonautomotive use cases are also part of the new joint venture’s scope. A final agreement is expected by Q3 and closing before year end 2020. All potential transactions are subject to examination and approval by the responsible competition authorities.
The company said that it will be concentrating on streamlining the production process so that its trucks can be built in a three-week timeframe. The company converts diesel trucks to electric power.
notes some minor drift, a matter of couple of months, in the timing as the company continues to work on sourcing and purchasing suitable land and tweaking the agreement.
With around 272 units using the SEA-Drive electric power system built or committed to since the company’s commercial inception in 2017, the company foresees another threefigure year this year and will be looking for four figures by 2022.
Mr Fairweather points out that SEA is “very committed to regional areas” and that the company will run out of space in Dandenong South in early 2021 and the company very much needs to free up assembly space.
SEA-Drives can now be found in a growing list of trucks such as Isuzu, Hino, Iveco, Ford van, Mercedes-Benz and Dennis Eagle vehicles, the latter two for waste-trucks. The company has a presence in Australia, New Zealand, the US, Thailand, South Africa and Israel, and it is also setting up an assembly plant in the Latrobe Valley. SEA Electric president Tony Fairweather
Latrobe Valley Authority (LVA) reports the company has a large back order for vehicles and has employed five staff from Latrobe Valley who are working in their Dandenong facility while the Latrobe Valley operations get up and running. The priority for the company is first to identify and secure a suitable site, and it will be working closely with local council to have this secured by the end of 2019.
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