UK arm of EV start-up Arrival enters administration

The UK operations of struggling electric van group Arrival have gone into administration, putting more than 170 jobs at risk.

Arrival, which was backed by Hyundai and valued at $15bn when it listed in 2021, has shed most of its workforce in the past two years to save costs. It also switched its primary focus to a US vehicle, after ditching plans for a bus, car and European van. 

The move comes after the company saw its shares delisted from the Nasdaq stock exchange in New York last week, after failing to file annual accounts for 2022.

The company said it received a letter from the Securities and Exchanges Commission informing it that it “will suspend trading in the Company’s securities at the open of business on January 30, 2024”.

The decision “was the result of the company not being in compliance with NASDAQ’s continued listing standards . . . and the failure to submit a remediation plan related thereto”, Arrival said. 

The company, which has no meaningful revenues, last published quarterly results in May last year, when it disclosed £130mn of cash and few other financial details. 

Accountants EY on Monday said they were appointed to oversee the administration of two UK arms, and are “exploring options for the sale of the business and assets”, which include electric vehicle platforms and intellectual property. 

The business still has about 400 staff, of which 172 are in the UK and are affected by the administration. Some 39 people had been made redundant, EY said on Monday. 

It is the latest of the wave of EV start-ups that have folded in the past several months, including truckmaker Volta and battery group Protera, as newer entrants find themselves unable to raise capital amid higher interest rates and greater scepticism over their often-unprofitable businesses. 

Arrival once planned to manufacture electric vans using a revolutionary new “microfactory” system that avoided the large investment needs of large-scale automotive plants. It had several UK sites, including a factory in Bicester, a large development facility in Banbury and a headquarters office in Paddington, London. 

But the company has struggled to contain costs and was plagued by delays, problems with its factory, poor morale and distracting side-projects, including a secret plan to build an aircraft in a business unit called “JET”.

Arrival warned more than a year ago it risked running out of cash. Efforts to raise funding fell apart last year after the business said it found accounting errors in its books, but that it lacked the accounting staff to get to the bottom of the issue.