Nikola workers assemble the company’s Tre hydrogen fuel cell electric truck.

[Stay on top of transportation news: Get TTNews in your inbox.]

Truck maker Nikola recently reduced staffing levels as it seeks to control costs.

The Phoenix-based hydrogen fuel cell electric truck and battery-electric truck manufacturer in October cut 135 jobs, a move that CEO Steve Girsky acknowledged was tough to make.

“This is a difficult, but necessary, decision and we thank those team members who helped build Nikola and wish them the best moving forward,” he said in a statement provided to Transport Topics. “Nikola is a pioneer in the zero-emissions trucking and hydrogen infrastructure solution arenas, and to ensure long-term viability and maintain our first-mover advantage, we must scale our business appropriately for the future. To extend our runway, we are adjusting and rescaling our staffing needs.”

RELATED: Nikola Leads Field in Hydrogen Fuel Cell EV Deployment

Girsky since arriving at Nikola in August 2023 has sought to bolster the company’s executive ranks with industry veterans. Former General Motors executive Mary Chan was appointed chief operating officer in September 2023, while ex-Eaton finance chief Tom Okray became chief financial officer in March 2024.

Nikola in Q4 2023 raised more than $230 million to help fund its operations. In the third quarter of this year, it reported a loss of $200 million, narrower than the $425.5 million year-ago loss, but the company’s cash and cash equivalents as of Sept. 30 totaled $198.3 million, compared with $464.7 million at the end of 2023.

“We estimate that our existing cash is sufficient to fund our forecast operating costs and meet our obligations into but not beyond [the first quarter of] 2025,” Okray told analysts during the company’s most recent quarterly earnings call. “We are examining every opportunity to optimize cash.”

That may include partnerships, Girsky said during the call.

“We are actively talking to lots of potential different partners who value what we do and value what we’ve built,” he said. “It’s because we’ve been doing the hard work out front building the framework, and we have proof points. We’re on the road today with customers. So we are looking to build [a] coalition of the willing, [a] coalition of like-minded companies that want to pursue and push zero-emission forward because that’s all we do.”

Host Seth Clevenger and Features Coordinator Mike Senatore take you behind the scenes to unveil the 2024 Top 50 Global Freight Companies. Tune in above or by going to RoadSigns.ttnews.com.  

RELATED: Public-Private Partnerships Propel Hydrogen Infrastructure

Okray said potential partners include companies with corporatewide decarbonization goals, hydrogen producers and automotive original equipment manufacturers that want to bring a light-duty or heavy-duty hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicle to market.

Nikola is one of two hydrogen fuel cell electric truck makers to begin serial production of a Class 8 tractor in North America. The other, Hyzon, also is facing a cash crunch.

Legacy truck maker Paccar expects serial production of hydrogen fuel cell electric versions of Peterbilt’s 579 Model and Kenworth’s T680 tractors to begin in 2025.

Nikola sold a hydrogen production project in July 2023, one month after it cut 270 jobs and two months after it halted production of its battery-electric trucks.

Want more news? Listen to today’s daily briefing below or go here for more info:

Source link

#Truck #Maker #Nikola #Trims #Staff #CostCutting #Move

Volvo’s revamped VNL Class 8 tractor. (Volvo Trucks North America)

[Stay on top of transportation news: Get TTNews in your inbox.]

Volvo Trucks is targeting a 25% North American heavy-duty truck market share by 2030, according to executives at the company.

Volvo Trucks North America won a 10% share of Class 8 retail sales in 2023 while Mack Trucks captured a 6.8% share, according to Wards Intelligence data.

“Our ambition is for Volvo Trucks to have a 15% market share in North America. And it will happen,” company president Roger Alm said Nov. 14, while Mack is targeting a 10% slice of the pie.

“The untapped potential is huge in North America, and we have all the possibilities to make this happen now,” Alm told analysts during Volvo Trucks parent company Volvo Group’s Capital Markets Day in Dublin, Va.

VTNA relaunched its flagship semi, the VNL, in January and Mack is planning a similar if not more radical transformation of its key on-highway tractor in 2025, Mack President Stephen Roy revealed at the event.

The breakthrough aerodynamic design and next-gen technology found in every #AllNewVolvoVNL deliver mile after mile of unrivaled fuel efficiency. pic.twitter.com/C2OBRXARD9

— Volvo Trucks North America (@VolvoTrucksNA) October 16, 2024

“I really see this for Mack as an industry disrupter,” said Roy. “We go from a product that’s a fairly old product from a foundational standpoint to a premium product that will absolutely allow us to compete in 70% of the market.”

“We think we can triple our [longhaul] market share with the new product,” Mack’s top executive said, adding that the new flagship tractor, an expansion of Volvo Group’s North American truck production capacity and the end to supply chain woes would see Mack’s Class 8 market share vault the 10% barrier by 2030.

Volvo Group plans to open a truck production plant in Mexico for the first time in 2026 and bought Commercial Vehicle Group’s Kings Mountain, N.C., cab assembly plant, which had been slow in supplying bodies-in-white to Mack.

Volvo Group paid around $40 million for the Kings Mountain plant, adding 230 employees as a result. Mack already started to see improvements in total production as a result of the acquisition of the cab plant, Roy said during a presentation at the Capital Markets Day.

Roy’s counterpart at VTNA, Peter Voorhoeve, is similarly bullish about the sister brand’s prospects.

“The product has never been better. If you combine that with a more stable and stabilized supply chain, if you combine that with the extra capacity that we will get from both New River Valley and in Mexico, then I think that we have the elements to say that we are gearing for growth in North America with Volvo Trucks,” Voorhoeve said.

VTNA initiated operations of Plant 2 at the New River Valley manufacturing facility in Dublin its entirety for the first time June 21. 
Some $400 million was spent by Volvo on a revamp of New River Valley — which sits next to the Volvo Trucks customer center where the Capital Markets Day was held — ahead of the VNL redesign.

That spending and the 25% market share target was part of a long-term plan, according to Volvo Group CEO Martin Lundstedt.
“Five, six years ago, we did see that we are getting our act together. We are getting our act together when it comes to serving the customer: customer satisfaction; we are getting our act together when it actually comes to different ranges; we’re getting our act together when it comes to our profitability with captive powertrains and services etc.,” said the parent company’s top executive.

“At that time, we said ‘now it is time to take the next step,’ because you cannot grow yourself out of other problems; you need to have the strong foundation that we have,” he said. “Then we took a bold decision, now we do a coordinated end-to-end effort. And that is what we see the result of.” 

Host Seth Clevenger and Features Coordinator Mike Senatore take you behind the scenes to unveil the 2024 Top 50 Global Freight Companies. Tune in above or by going to RoadSigns.ttnews.com.  

A large part of the push will be via trucks using fuels that are not diesel, said Lundstedt. Volvo expects all the new trucks it sells to be zero-emission by 2040. 

In June, VTNA provided a first glimpse of a VNL 440 Electric. The order book for the VNL Electric is expected to open shortly. Volvo’s Cespira hydrogen internal combustion engine joint venture with Westport Fuel Systems began operations in the third quarter.

But Lundstedt told analysts the path to zero-emission trucks will be bumpy, even while Volvo remains committed to its goals.
“The long-term trend is clear, our markets will transform … but what looks smooth and stable is not,” he said. 

As a result, Volvo needed to be flexible enough to adapt to hurdles and accelerations, he said, noting that alternative fuel trucks were competing with an extremely efficient legacy diesel value chain.

Electric truck adoption requires the trucks, fossil-free energy, infrastructure, a supply network, customer peace of mind plus incentives and a price on carbon to succeed, he said.

Want more news? Listen to today’s daily briefing below or go here for more info:

Source link

#Volvo #Aims #Raise #Share #North #American #Truck #Market