DETROIT — Startup Bollinger Motors will provide its electric chassis to EAVX, a business unit of JB Poindexter & Co., one of the nation’s largest upfitters of commercial vehicles.
JB Poindexter, a Houston company whose various business units make a broad range of vehicles from Class 6 box trucks to ambulances and hearses, will buy from Bollinger completely engineered and manufactured chassis assemblies that include the electric motors, axles, suspension and other components.
Bollinger has been developing its Chass-E for commercial applications alongside the boxy, retro-looking consumer-intended electric B1 SUV and B2 pickup.
“We have been talking to EAVX and working with them for over a year,” CEO Robert Bollinger told Automotive News at the company’s headquarters in Oak Park, Mich. “In the future, when we are in production, we will be supplying Class 3-6 all-electric platforms for EAVX to upfit into walk-in vans, box trucks and the like.”
The Chass-E ranges in wheelbase length from 139 inches to 243 inches.
“Working with EAVX will allow us to offer our innovative all-electric solutions to a broader market of commercial customers and accelerate EV adoption across the country,” he said.
Bollinger’s engineering facility in Oak Park, just north of Detroit, is not large enough to house a manufacturing line to build the Chass-E. The company has been negotiating with contract manufacturers to assemble the Chass-E, B1 and B2, Bollinger said. An announcement could come early next year.
“Partnering with Bollinger allows EAVX to continue our holistic approach to integration of systems between cab chassis and the body,” Mark Hope, COO of EAVX, said in a statement.
Meanwhile, engineers in Oak Park are working on the next iterations of the B1 and B2, readying them for low-volume production. The company also has agreements in place for nationwide distribution and service when production begins. In the Midwest region, LaFontaine Automotive Group will sell and service Bollinger vehicles.
Robert Bollinger, who made his fortune is the cosmetics business, founded the company in 2015 in New York. He moved it to the Detroit area in 2018.
