Arrival Van

The pre-production prototype of a fully electric van, which was also the first vehicle developed by the British company Arrival, was presented in August 2017.^[4] Nine prototypes were built for the Royal Mail as a trial in 2017, in three weights of 3.5, 6, and 7.5 t (7,700, 13,200, and 16,500 lb);^[5] they were used to distribute mail from the central London depot.^[6] Arrival developed the Van in partnership with UPS, who had plans to deploy 35 prototypes in London and Paris in 2017 as a trial.^[6]

In 2020, UPS took a minority stake in Arrival and ordered 10,000 Vans with advanced driver-assistance systems that would be used in the United States and Europe.^[7] The custom UPS Vans were scheduled to be delivered by 2024, and the contract included an option for an additional 10,000 Vans.^[8] Including the option, Arrival expected US$1.2 billion in revenue from the UPS contract.^[3]: 59 The Vans would have an estimated range of 150 mi (240 km) and were planned to be assembled in multiple 'microfactories' instead of a single production facility.^[9]

Arrival achieved European type certification and whole vehicle type approval for the Van in June 2022.^[10] In August 2022, Arrival slashed its forecast for vehicles delivered in 2022 from 400–600 to 20 and announced it would reorganize to cut costs, possibly including layoffs.^[11] As part of the reorganization, the start of production at Charlotte slipped to 2023.^[12]

The first Arrival Van was produced at Bicester in late September 2022; however, serial production did not commence, as the entire production run at Bicester for 2022 was set aside for testing, validation, and quality control.^[13] Arrival announced in October 2022 the Bicester Van plant would be wound down and the company would shift its focus to Van production in Charlotte, citing the size of the potential market in North America, the Inflation Reduction Act, and its tax credits as influencing its decision.^[14] Limited production of Vans was intended to continue in Bicester, but that microfactory would not be scaled up to mass production; Arrival also paused development and production of its Bus and Car.^[15][16] Arrival announced in November that it does not expect to deliver any Vans to customers before 2024.^[17]

In 2023, Arrival announced company-wide layoffs, reducing its staff by 25% as it was seeking to reduce its expenses. In January 2024, Sky News reported that Arrival was negotiating with Ernst & Young for that company to act as an administrator if it could not secure rescue funding.^[18] By February, Arrival had declared bankruptcy without having sold any vehicles.^[19] During the liquidation sale, some of its assets were sold to Canoo, including "advanced manufacturing equipment".^[20]

The Arrival microfactory concept uses multifunctional robots to reduce the number of human workers and machines; the cost of a new microfactory was estimated at US$50 million, approximately 5% the cost of a conventional automobile assembly line. The radical reduction in capital costs was expected to allow the company "to build vehicles profitably at really any volume", according to Avinash Rugoobur, Arrival's president.^[21] Arrival had an annual production volume target of 10,000 vehicles per microfactory, providing a gross margin of $100 million for each plant, including operating expenses.^[22]: 40

The plant in Bicester, England was chosen as the lead Van microfactory and Arrival completed robotic tool installation there by May 2022;^[23] the start of Van production was scheduled for Autumn 2022.^[24] United States production also was scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of 2022 at the second Arrival Van microfactory in Charlotte, North Carolina; the Charlotte microfactory was intended to fill the UPS order of up to 10,000 Vans.^[25] Tools for the Charlotte microfactory were scheduled to be installed in late summer 2022.^[23] Additional planned microfactories were planned to be built in Rock Hill, South Carolina and Madrid, Spain.^[26]