It’s over. The Nikola Badger electric pickup truck is a no-go. The stillborn truck that would have been a bold addition to the smorgasbord of forthcoming electric pickup trucks has been stuffed underground for good. Call it what you may: another tragedy of 2020; a smoke and mirrors dream that never really had hope; a stroke of good luck for other electric startups. Regardless, without an OE partnership, the Badger program will not continue.
But wait, didn’t Nikola just strike a deal with General Motors that included the production of the Nikola Badger? Yes, and that’s why there was actual hope that the Badger, under the wing of a giant deep-pocked manufacturer such as GM, would actually come to fruition. The proposed strategic alliance hashed out in September basically said that GM would take a $2 billion equity stake in Nikola (about 11 percent ownership) and would engineer and produce the 906-hp Badger. The agreement, which also included some GM tech for Nikola semi-trucks, was scheduled to have closed in early December.
However, that original deal—fraught with legalese drama—has changed. On the last day of November, GM and Nikola scrapped the original strategic alliance and signed something new. In this new non-binding Memorandum of Understanding, GM agreed to supply Nikola with only its Hydrotec hydrogen fuel cell technology to integrate into the EV manufacturer’s commercial Class 7 and Class 8 zero-emission semi-trucks—if and when the semis ever got to that point. Nikola expects to begin testing by the end of 2021. Nikola chief executive officer Mark Russell sees semi-trucks as the company’s “core business” and fuel cells as an increasingly important segment of the semi-truck market thanks to their efficiency in weight and consumption.
For now, the deal doesn’t give Nikola access to GM’s Ultium battery technology. Since the original partnership also included GM supplying Nikola with semi-truck tech, the new deal (which is not a done deal yet, by the way) basically axed GM’s equity stake and the Badger portion of the old one. Unfortunately, the Badger-related bits were what mattered most to pickup truck enthusiasts.
Is there any hope for the Nikola Badger electric pickup truck? The answer seems to be a resounding no. It’s dead. This dreary news has been substantiated by the fact that Nikola is actively refunding all preorder deposits for the Badger.
