Wrightspeed, the firm founded by Tesla co-founder Ian Wright, builds electric powertrains for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles. Now the company has announced an agreement with vehicle manufacturer Matthews Specialty Vehicles to convert buses, trucks and specialty vehicles to EVs and/or PHEVs. The companies aim to produce 5,000 vehicles over the next five years. For the… Read more »
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Wrightspeed partners with AxleTech to meet demand for heavy-duty vehicles
Business is picking up for Wrightspeed, the manufacturer of plug-in powertrains for heavy-duty vehicles headed by Tesla founder Ian Wright. The company is expanding its supply chain team, bringing on experts with experience at Tesla, Ford, Cummins, and others, and scaling up operations to meet demand from customers such as New Zealand bus operator NZB… Read more »
Wrightspeed plug-in garbage trucks take to the road
California refuse collection company the Ratto Group will roll out 15 refuse trucks retrofitted with Wrightspeed’s Route range-extended electric powertrain over the next 12 months. The Wrightspeed Route powertrain is optimized for heavy-duty frequent-stop drive cycles, like those of refuse trucks. It replaces a vehicle’s engine, transmission and differential systems with a fuel-agnostic microturbine generator… Read more »
Wrightspeed to provide its turbine-based PHEV powertrain to New Zealand bus operator
Ian Wright was a co-founder of Tesla, but he soon left to start his own company, partly because he felt that large commercial vehicles represented a better target for electrification than passenger cars (read more about Wright’s electrifying adventures in the April 2014 issue of Charged, and in the book Tesla Motors). Since then, Wrightspeed’s… Read more »
Wrightspeed introduces new Fulcrum turbine generator for range-extended EV architecture
Wrightspeed, the startup led by Tesla co-founder Ian Wright, has identified a promising target for electrification – it retrofits plug-in powertrains to urban service trucks, the most inefficient and polluting of commercial vehicles. Customers include FedEx, which recently ordered an additional 25 of the company’s powertrains. Now Wrightspeed has unveiled the Fulcrum, a new turbine… Read more »
Wrightspeed secures order of 25 powertrains from FedEx
Wrightspeed, the electric powertrain startup led by Tesla co-founder Ian Wright, has just landed its biggest fish to date: an order of 25 powertrains from giant fleet operator Federal Express. The company has tested Wrightspeed’s technology in two of its trucks and decided to take the next step. Financial details of the deal are confidential,… Read more »
Q&A with Ian Wright: The CEO of Wrightspeed on Tesla, gas turbines and electric trucks
Ian Wright is originally from New Zealand. He came to California in 1993, where he happened to be a neighbor of Tesla founder Martin Eberhard. He worked with optical switching systems at a company called Altamar Networks until it went out of business, then decided he wanted to start his own company. Eberhard and his… Read more »
California Energy Commission awards $5.789 million grant to Wrightspeed for range-extended EV powertrains
The California Energy Commission announced yesterday that Silicon Valley startup Wrightspeed will receive a $5.789 million grant as part of the Commission’s Alternative and Renewable Fuel and Vehicle Technology Program. Grants also went to Zero Motorcycles and Tesla Motors. Wrightspeed will use the funds to accelerate manufacturing of its Route retrofit powertrain for the medium-duty… Read more »
Between the wheels: AxleTech goes electric
Can a company that’s 100 years old be called a startup? Mary Petrovich, Executive Chairman of AxleTech, certainly thinks so. AxleTech was founded in 1919 as Wisconsin Custom Built Axles, and has seen a century’s worth of sales, acquisitions, and rebrandings since then. Petrovich herself brought AxleTech back from the brink of failure not once,… Read more »
BYD and Wayne Engineering unveil electric refuse truck
Electrification isn’t just for glamorous sports cars – the humble garbage truck is a likely candidate too. Companies including Motiv Power Systems and Wrightspeed have deployed plug-in refuse trucks. Now Chinese automaker BYD and Wayne Engineering, a manufacturer of chassis-mounted productivity solutions for the solid waste industry, have announced the launch of a pure electric… Read more »