Nikola filed for bankruptcy. Meet the other failed EV startups
Lordstown Motors was founded in 2018 by Steve Burns, the former CEO of a small commercial vehicle maker named Workhorse Group (WKHS), who saw an opportunity when General Motors needed to sell its Lordstown, Ohio, manufacturing plant.
The automaker began negotiating with Burns under pressure from President Trump, who promoted the deal before Burns had even secured financing or named the new company. The resulting company, Lordstown Motors, aimed to sell a truck armed with electric motors on each wheel hub but never seemed to run out of problems.
In 2021, short-seller Hindenburg Research accused Burns and Lordstown of exaggerating how many orders it had received for the truck, which itself ran into issues a myriad of issues. During the last three months of 2022, the year production began, just 31 trucks were built. Only two trucks were delivered to customers the following quarter.
Lordstown filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in June 2023 but re-emerged in March 2024 under a new name: Nu Ride Inc. and seeking “potential business combinations.” Its latest quarterly report shows $58,251 in total assets and $15,247 in total liabilities.
The only announcements the company has outside of ownership and quarterly reports are related to its lawsuit against Foxconn, a company best known for making Apple’s (AAPL) iPhones. Lordstown has accused Foxconn of misleading it about plans to collaborate on a line of EVs.
