Walmart Purchases 4,500 Canoo EVs, With Possibly More on the Way
Image: Canoo
Canoo, the company building those cool and clever EV mini buses, announced it picked up another contract with the retail giant Walmart on Monday for 4,500 of its Lifestyle Delivery Vehicle EVs with the option to purchase up to 10,000 in the future.
Canoo’s stock rocketed up 37 percent before the bell on Monday once the news hit, according to Reuters. That’s good news for Canoo, which released a pretty dire first-quarter earnings report back in May and called into question the company’s viability without a serious cash infusion. CEO Tony Aquila told Jalopnik the car company wasn’t going anywhere, and it seems they might just weather that rocky first quarter after all. Neither Walmart nor Canoo released financial details about the deal.
To reach its goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2040, Walmart has been snatching up EVs from multiple companies, like 5,000 vehicles from GM’s commercial EV business, BrightDrop.
“We are proud to have been selected by Walmart, one of the most sophisticated buyers in the world, to provide our high-tech, all-electric, American-made Lifestyle Delivery Vehicle to add to their impressive logistics capabilities,” Aquila, said in a press release. “Walmart’s massive store footprint provides a strategic advantage in today’s growing ‘Need it now’ mindset and an unmatched opportunity for growing EV demand, especially at today’s gas prices.”
Aquila told Reuters the company plans to build 14,000 to 17,000 vehicles in 2023 — a bit of a downgrade from the 23,000 Canoos in 2023 Aquila told us back in May. But hey, they’re still in the game and still looking beyond just delivery vehicles. Canoo also has an EV truck, which we find very slick, and an EV sedan in the works.
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Selling a few thousands EVs sold to the largest retailer in the U.S. is all well and good, but I’m more stoked to see a Canoo LDV deliver astronauts to their latest lunar missions for NASA. Canoo has until July 2023 to deliver the specialized vans, which will need extra room for equipment, space suits and room for eight people, while traveling 50 miles on a single charge.
