When Hyundai and KIA announced last week that they were jointly investing $100 million in UK startup Arrival, they probably knew something we didn’t know — until now.
UPS has signed a deal with Arrival to buy 10,000 of its electric delivery vans between now and 2024 and to possibly purchase another 10,000 after that. The vans will be placed in service in the UK, Europe, and North America. UPS has also invested an undisclosed amount in the company.
The reason why UPS did this is pretty simple.
The Arrival electric delivery vans are priced about the same as conventional delivery vans but have 50% lower operating costs.
What fleet manager wouldn’t get excited about that deal?
Arrival has developed components, sustainable materials, and software to customize both the vehicles commercial fleet owners use as well as strategies to streamline their operations to drive down costs.
Arrival’s unique skateboard platforms allow the company to create vehicles in any weight, type, size, or shape to match customer requirements.
The company’s micro-factories can be rapidly deployed close to areas of demand across the globe. In theory, that means those micro-factories could be located near the UPS hubs where the delivery vans will be used.
It will be interesting to see how the micro-factory concept plays out in practice.
Reference- Arrival website and press release, Electrek, Clean Technica, UPS PR