(New York) Electric and hydrogen truck maker Nikola, which has faced many setbacks in the past two years, delivered its first two electric trucks to the Port of Los Angeles on Friday.
The two copies of the “Nikola Tre” were ordered by Total Transportation Services Inc. (TTSI), a Californian company specializing in logistics, as part of a pilot project with two electric trucks and two hydrogen trucks, a statement said. . They are to be used in the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.
If the experience is satisfactory, TTSI will order a total of 100 vehicles from Nikola.
“Production, performance and maintenance will be key, and we are confident that Nikola will excel on all three fronts,” said Vic LaRosa, boss of TTSI, quoted in the statement.
Nikola is thus delivering, as he had announced, its first trucks in the fourth quarter.
The group still plans to sell 25 in total by the end of the year, as expected in November, a spokesperson confirmed. However, this is much less than the 50 and 100 vehicles initially announced, the group having to revise its ambitions downwards in August, then again in November, due to supply problems.
Nikola had made a standout debut on Wall Street in June 2020 before sealing in September a promising partnership with General Motors that seemed to bring legitimacy to the Phoenix, Arizona-based company founded in 2015.
But the company was, days later, caught in a whirlwind after a report by investment firm Hindenburg Research claiming Nikola was a “complex fraud based on dozens of lies” told over the years by its founder. , Trevor Milton.
Mr. Milton, who resigned shortly after, was subsequently indicted by US authorities for having “brazenly” embellished the activity of the start-up during multiple public interventions in order to raise the action.
Nikola shares took more than 6% around 2:15 p.m. on the New York Stock Exchange after the announcement of the first deliveries.