EV Production news20 Feb 2020 11:09
The London taxi factory in Coventry is to increase production sevenfold in the next three years as it begins assembly of a plug-in hybrid electric delivery van.Jörg Hofmann, chief executive of the London Electric Vehicle Company, said that the van, based on the new black cab, would be marketed to the Royal Mail postal service and to large fleet users, such as BT. LEVC was formed from the 2013 buyout of the collapsed London Taxi Company by Geely, the Chinese carmaker. It began production in 2017 of redesigned, re-engineered hybrid black cabs capable of running on an electric charge for 80 miles, to meet rules that all new London taxis must be capable of operating on zero emissions.The company built and delivered 2,500 black cabs in 2019, which it projects as the peak of domestic annual demand. It now aims to build an additional 3,500 a year for export to Europe, Japan, the Gulf states and Australasia.From the end of this year, assembly of LEVC’s hybrid electric van will begin and a production run of about 14,000 a year plus 6,000 black cabs will have its purpose-built factory at Ansty, north of Coventry, at its 20,000 full capacity in 2022.Backed by £500 million of Geely investment, Mr Hofmann, a 53-year-old former German army officer, said: “We need to get out of the niche. That was the problem with the old London Taxi Company focused on the London taxi market. That is very niche and in the long-term not a sustainable business model. We need to find new markets and more importantly new products. Not to do so would not be very good business when we have a factory with a capacity of 20,000 [vehicles a year].”
The commitment by LEVC comes amid an apparent dawn for electric van production in Britain. Arrival, a company backed by a Russian entrepreneur, is to build zero-emission vans in Banbury, Oxfordshire. Morris Commercial, which is resurrecting the Morris J-Type — backed by a Chinese entrepreneur — plans to build stylised electric vans in Worcestershire. Jaguar Land Rover says that its electric-autonomous Project Vector concept also will be used as a final-mile delivery vehicle.
Mr Hofmann admitted that there were two elephants in the room for the LEVC vans, similar in size to a smaller Ford Transit and expected to retail at between £40,000 and £50,000: first, the government has yet to confirm that it will extend an £8,000 subsidy for electric vans beyond the end of March; second, there is the spectre of a bad Brexit for a company that envisages exporting 60 per cent of its volumes. “If we don’t have a free-trade agreement, then we are really in trouble,” he said.
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