Startup truck-maker Lordstown Motors is now trading on the tech-heavy Nasdaq stock exchange.
Lordstown Motors listed for the first time Monday under the ticker symbol RIDE. Their initial public offering culminates a $675 million merger announced this summer with DiamondPeak Holdings, a special purpose acquisition company.
While the big American vehicle makers trade on the New York Stock Exchange, Lordstown Motors CEO Steve Burns says the software used in his electric pickup trucks makes it more like a tech-stock.
“It’s a highly technical play, just the software in the vehicle is a tremendous amount of high-tech," Burns said. "We’re making our own battery packs, and we’re using hub motors, where the motor is in the wheel.”
Burns says the pickup being built in the former General Motors factory in Lordstown is still in the prototype phase. He hopes to have full production ready by next September.
The all-electric pickup truck already has 40,000 pre-orders from commercial fleet customers, Burns says.
Burns left his former company, Cincinnati-based Workhorse Group, to form Lordstown Motors in the wake of GM abandoning the Lordstown plant. Now Workhorse is one of three finalists for a more than $6 billion contract with the U.S. Postal Service to build its next generation delivery vehicles.
Burns is hesitant to speculate, but says if Workhorse is chosen, Lordstown would partner with the company to build the chassis.
“I hope they win," Burns says. "And if they win, that we could use our great facility here to help them fulfill the contract."
The Post Office contract is expected to be announced before the end of the year.
