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How Bezos-Backed Slate Plans To Build An Affordable EV Truck In The U Second · THE DAILY BRIEF

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Supported to the tunes of not a billion or closer
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: to ten billion, and the ones that have been funded
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: by one billion are around or are nearly not around.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Like a billion dollars doesn't launch a company at this point,
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  Speaker 1: a car company.
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  Speaker 2: What was your pitch to investors?
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  Speaker 3: We really showed them the proposition of the need for
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  Speaker 3: the affordable vehicle, the market demand that'll be out there
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  Speaker 3: for this type of vehicle.
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  Speaker 2: It resonated with buyers too. Live Lee and Patrick Anderson
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  Speaker 2: are EV converts now. They both own the mock E
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  Speaker 2: and a Chevrolet Equinox. Ev Lee rights for an EV blog,
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  Speaker 2: and the pair have a YouTube channel. They were both
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  Speaker 2: invited to the Slate reveal in Long Beach, California.
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  Speaker 4: As they were talking about it during the reveal, it
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  Speaker 4: was like one, let's put in a reservation.
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  Speaker 5: When we were there at their reveal and we watched
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  Speaker 5: them flip the track body style, they pulled the truck
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  Speaker 5: out on stage, they drove it down to another stage,
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  Speaker 5: and then they flipped it into the suv and they
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  Speaker 5: wrapped it within an hour.
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  Speaker 4: I love the fact that like we could we could
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  Speaker 4: do a wrap kit, and the fact that it's like
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  Speaker 4: it can be changed again, makes it so that you're
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  Speaker 4: not committing to like I'm gonna I'm going to make
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  Speaker 4: this modification and it costs me so much money, like
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  Speaker 4: I'm stuck with it.
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  Speaker 6: We were really hearing from people that actually they'd like
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  Speaker 6: to return to something much simpler. We could reduce things
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  Speaker 6: that folks don't care about that can help us drive
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  Speaker 6: the cost down.
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  Speaker 2: Cole Skrogham is another reservation holder. He's an IMPS racing
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  Speaker 2: engineer and the executive director of a nonprofit that gives
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  Speaker 2: college students hands on experience restoring high end vehicles. He
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  Speaker 2: was considering a slate as a truck the program could
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  Speaker 2: use for running errands and in its program as a
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  Speaker 2: potential teaching tool.
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  Speaker 7: I'm from the generation of simplicity. I remember roll up winds.
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  Speaker 7: I remember those things that generally are are pretty uh
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  Speaker 7: straightforward and difficult to break.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: For those who want to dress up the truck or
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  Speaker 2: convert it to an SUV. There's a catalog of over
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  Speaker 2: one hundred accessories.
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  Speaker 8: The vehicle has been designed with mechanical and electric connections
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  Speaker 8: that allow for very easy, do it yourself modification. So
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  Speaker 8: the SUV kit, for instance, the stereo connects easily when
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  Speaker 8: you bring it in. The power windows again have the connections.
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  Speaker 9: All of that has been designed to be flat packed
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  Speaker 9: so that it can be shipped to customers driveways. We
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  Speaker 9: are also working on partners that you can schedule the
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  Speaker 9: truck to go in and they will do the upfit
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  Speaker 9: for you from the truck to the SUV.
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: In lieu of paint are dcalsand wraps. Sheets of adhesive
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  Speaker 2: vehicle wraps are already common, but cost at least around
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  Speaker 2: two thousand dollars to four grand. Slate's kit costs five
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  Speaker 2: hundred dollars. You can put it on yourself. The truck's
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  Speaker 2: small removable panels are meant to make the job easier.
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  Speaker 2: The company plan to offer tutorials for accessory installation.
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  Speaker 8: We're launching a platform called Slate University on the website
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  Speaker 8: that has all of the DIY videos to break them
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  Speaker 8: into very small and easy steps.
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  Speaker 2: They're also encouraging owners or even outside companies to make
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  Speaker 2: their own parts.
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  Speaker 3: It's really almost open sourced if you think about it.
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  Speaker 7: I was particularly attracted to the idea of the modular
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  Speaker 7: nature of the vehicle, customizing it, which would be really
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  Speaker 7: interesting for our use.
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  Speaker 2: But first the Slate has to sell, and there are challenges.
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  Speaker 2: The price and the way the vehicle is configured, two doors,
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  Speaker 2: rear wheel drive, and evy with limited range. All this
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  Speaker 2: might turn off some customers. Slate made headlines in July
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: when it changed language on its website about its pricing.
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  Speaker 2: What had been an expected price under twenty thousand dollars
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  Speaker 2: with federal incentives is now in the mid twenties.
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  Speaker 10: Can they get the price point down low enough with
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  Speaker 10: out the tax credits, where even with the features that
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  Speaker 10: consumers are going to want to add, that still remains
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  Speaker 10: a competitively priced vehicle in the market compared to what
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  Speaker 10: else is already out there.
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  Speaker 3: We have always said that we're priced in the mid twenties,
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  Speaker 3: but for those who qualified for the fentral incentive, it
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  Speaker 3: could be less than twenty thousand dollars, and that still
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  Speaker 3: rings true today for many states that are offering incentives
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  Speaker 3: that can bring it down below that price point.
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  Speaker 2: Prices rise the more you kit it out.
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  Speaker 8: It'll go into the high thirties. But every accessory that
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  Speaker 8: we're making is very thoughtful and very value conscious, just
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  Speaker 8: like the vehicle itself.
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  Speaker 2: Even at twenty seven thousand dollars, there's more competition.
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  Speaker 3: Well.
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  Speaker 2: The Mitsubishi Mirage is the only vehicle in the US
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  Speaker 2: currently selling below twenty thousand dollars. Below thirty, there are
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  Speaker 2: twenty different models. The Ford Mavericks starts just above twenty
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  Speaker 2: eight thousand. It has four doors, power windows and locks,
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  Speaker 2: infotainment and any other features.
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  Speaker 10: All of a sudden, that price point just doesn't look
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  Speaker 10: very competitive anymore. Now it's possible Slaate could say, Okay,
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  Speaker 10: we're going to lower that price. Instead of twenty seven thousand,
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  Speaker 10: that's the base price. Maybe you're looking twenty three or
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  Speaker 10: twenty four. But now you start to eat into that
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  Speaker 10: profit margin.
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  Speaker 2: For Livlee and Patrick Anderson, the price jump on at
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  Speaker 2: least a base model is not a deal breaker at all.
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  Speaker 4: The advantages of an inexpensive EV, whether it's twenty thousand
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  Speaker 4: or twenty five thousand, something like that, it's still there.
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  Speaker 4: So it's still like our primary choice. Within reason, I.
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  Speaker 7: Believe they're going to struggle to sell the truck under thirty.
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  Speaker 10: If you only have one hundred and fifty mile range,
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  Speaker 10: you're competing against the base Chevy Equinox EV, which also
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  Speaker 10: starts at thirty five thousand dollars but that one has
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  Speaker 10: four doors, has easy access, has more cargo space, and
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  Speaker 10: has over three hundred miles of range.
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  Speaker 3: We're not going for long distance. What we're looking is
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  Speaker 3: for people who just need really affordable transportation day to day.
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  Speaker 9: We studied commuting needs and about ninety percent of the
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  Speaker 9: commuters today are at forty miles or on a daily usage.
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  Speaker 5: When my rapho would past admissions in California, I was
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  Speaker 5: borrowing a friend's twenty twelve Leep that got like max
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  Speaker 5: fifty miles of range. So that's what we had as
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  Speaker 5: a second car for a year and a half and
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  Speaker 5: it was absolutely fine.
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  Speaker 2: The two door configuration could also limit appeal. Two door
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  Speaker 2: trucks and SUVs used to be the norm, but today
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  Speaker 2: of the roughly two and a half million pickups sold
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  Speaker 2: in the US, only about ninety thousand or two doors.
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  Speaker 2: SUVs are even more skewed. Why do you have a
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  Speaker 2: two door?
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  Speaker 3: For many people, that's all they need. And if you
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  Speaker 3: look around, often when you see people out driving the truck,
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  Speaker 3: there's you know, a single individual or you know, maybe
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  Speaker 3: two passengers.
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  Speaker 2: And rear wheel drive vehicles are also only a tiny
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  Speaker 2: share of both SUVs and pickups.
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  Speaker 9: It's a back to basics only the essentials truck, and
• 7:00
  Speaker 9: a lot of our benchmarks actually came from the seventies
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  Speaker 9: and eighties where it was a proper truck.
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  Speaker 4: I like it from a driving dynamics, but yeah, I
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  Speaker 4: think that is going to be a concern for a
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  Speaker 4: lot of people anywhere where it snows or inclement weather
• 7:13
  Speaker 4: or even rainy weather.
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  Speaker 7: Well first car was a sixty five Beetle, so rear
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  Speaker 7: real draft sounds great to me.
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  Speaker 10: I really like the concept of what they're doing. I
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  Speaker 10: think it's going to be really hard. It's going to
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  Speaker 10: be hard for them to succeed.
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  Speaker 2: What's the big kind of long term vision here?
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  Speaker 3: We first want to just get to market, and then
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  Speaker 3: there are other things that we're considering. Now, maybe a
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  Speaker 3: second type of platform were able to do more. But
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  Speaker 3: really what we're focused on today is just making sure
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  Speaker 3: that this truck is going to be brought to market
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  Speaker 3: at an affordable price point and a very high quality product.