Arrival Ltd is a London based technology company with a mission to make electric vehicles mainstream in order to drive the adoption of sustainable technologies. The company is currently focused on the production of lightweight commercial vehicles. In June 2020, Arrival announced a new passenger bus designed for coronavirus-era social distancing. Van production is carried out in Banbury, Oxfordshire. In March 2020, Arrival acquired a new factory in Bicester that will likely be operational in 2021. Arrival claim that their electric vehicles are the first EVs that cost the same as petrol and diesel equivalents. Arrival calls this approach "Generation 2.0". The company is making an electric platform which can be scaled to make multiple different vehicle variants in multiple vehicle categories.
Vehicles
Small Van
There are curretly working prototypes of Arrival's electric van. The van has enough range on a single charge to complete atleast 120 miles without recharging. Although full specifications on the size, load capacity and volume have not been publicly released. United Parcel Service has placed an order for 10,000 small vans from Arrival.
Bus
The Arrival bus is curretly undergoing Beta prototype testing.
History
Founded in 2015 by Denis Sverdlov, former General Director of Yota Group, a Russian mobile supplier and mobile service provider, Arrival is headquartered in London with an R&D facility in Banbury and further offices in North America, Germany, Israel, Russia and Netherlands. In August 2017, the Royal Mail announced an agreement with Arrival to trial nine vehicles in the ranges of 3.5, 6 and 7 tonnes GVW. The United Parcel Service announced a deal with Arrival to trial 35 vehicles across London and Paris in May 2019 as part of a wider strategy to electrify their massive fleet of delivery vehicles. In September 2019, Arrival was placed 19th in LinkedIn's Top Startups 2019 list identifying the top 25 hottest UK companies to work for. BlackBerry announced in October 2019 that they would be powering Arrival's Generation 2.0 intelligent electric vehicles. As part of the agreement, BlackBerry will license its BlackBerry QNX technology to Arrival, including its QNX SDP 7.0 real-time operating system which will serve as the secure foundation for ADAS features within the company's vehicle platform. Mike Ableson, former Vice President of EV Infrastructure and Global Strategy at General Motors, joined Arrival in October 2019 as CEO of North America. In December 2019, Cubic Telecom, a connectivity management software provider, partnered with Arrival to deliver intelligent connectivity software to their electric vehicle fleets. Arrival announced in January 2020 that Hyundai Motor Group and Kia Motors had invested €100 million in the company marking the start of a strategic partnership between the automakers to accelerate the adoption of commercial electric vehicles globally. Following the investment, Arrival revealed they have achieved "unicorn" status, valuing the start-up at €3 billion. Arrival plan to use 10,000 sq m "microfactories" to build their electric vehicles having developed a "skateboard" platform containing a drive train and batteries. On January 29, 2020, Arrival announced that UPS had invested in the company and placed an order for 10,000 Generation 2 electric vehicles to be rolled out across the UK, Europe and North America before 2024 as part of their transition towards a zero-emissions fleet. The deal was reported to be worth $400m along with an equity stake in the company of an undisclosed size. The purpose-built electric vehicles have been co-developed by Arrival and UPS in order to meet UPS's exact specifications, including the latest advanced control and safety features. Arrival's Chief Strategy Officer is Avinash Rugoobur, former Head of Strategy for GM Cruise Automation. On June 17, 2020 Arrival revealed a zero-emission bus. The bus will be priced the same as an equivalent diesel bus, according to the company. Lower running costs will make it cheaper for operators in the long term.
