The struggling Oklahoma-based electric van startup Canoo appears to have reached the end of the road.
According to an internal email obtained by TechCrunch, the startup has placed employees on a "mandatory unpaid break" through the end of the year.
The email said that just a few days before Christmas, the company locked employees out of Canoo's systems.
As of mid-November, the startup had $700k in cash or cash equivalents as it rounded out a very turbulent year amid an ongoing EV downturn.
"It recently closed the Los Angeles office that used to serve as its headquarters. It has lost a lot of executives, including its chief technology officer, chief financial officer, and general counsel," TechCrunch noted.
Auto blog Jalopnik provided more color on Canoo's struggles, including how "the company spent twice as much on a private jet for its CEO than it had earned for the entire year of 2023. It burned through capital and now seems unable to wrap up the year."
"Canoo was supposed to bring automotive manufacturing back to the state of Oklahoma, and the company received taxpayer-funded, performance-based incentives totaling $100 million spaced out over 10 years to do exactly that," Jalopnik said, adding, "But the way things are going right now, it's questionable whether Canoo will last long enough to bring those promised steady jobs to the Sooner State."
A former employee provided Oklahoma news outlet KFOR with deeper insight into the startup, alleging that it has produced nothing...
"They have tons of equipment," the former employee said. "It looks great. They have literally everything to run an entire assembly line for cars."
Last December, Canoo proudly announced it had built its first three vehicles in the Oklahoma City plant, before selling them to the state.
The former employee told News 4 that "made in Oklahoma" announcement gave him a good laugh.
"I can tell you, those did not come off our assembly line," the former employee said. "If you talk to any Canoo employee, they'll tell you those do not come off the assembly line."
He says Canoo never paid the company that provided the software that the machines use to operate.
The former employee also says the company only ran the machines when showing them off to media or investors.
"The majority of those folks that were employed there, especially those hourly people, were just standing around twiddling their thumbs," the former employee said.
The company has boasted about partnerships with Walmart, DoD, and the USPS over the years...
Shares (GOEV) plunged into the abyss since it SPAC'd in late 2020.
What a giant waste of money.
