Cleantech investment company TrueGreen and its electric bus subsidiary Nexport have announced a $700 million plan to create a new electric vehicle manufacturing industry in Australia, based at a newly acquired site in NSW’s Southern Highlands.
TrueGreen, which describes itself as a “positive impact investment group”, and Nexport, which says it is the largest supplier of electric buses in Australia, says the initiative has been inspired by the NSW Liberal government’s goal to transition its bus fleet with the purchase of 8,000 electric buses.
But the new manufacturing facility – located on 51 hectares near Moss Vale – will not just make electric buses, it will also make electric cars, trucks and deliver vans and other cleantech products.
“TrueGreen and Nexport are planning to bring automotive manufacturing back to Australia with the next generation of cost effective electric vehicles,” Luke Todd, the CEO of both TrueGreen and Nexport said in a statement ahead of the formal launch in Sydney on Monday.
“It’s vital to Australia’s long term future and prosperity that we look for advance cleantech manufacturing opportunities that we can export to other countries.
As noted on Friday by The Driven, TrueGreen is also the parent company of leading Australian electric bus manufacturer Gemilang which is supported by Nexport, a company that has, among other things, introduced an electric taxi service in Sydney’s Northern Beaches using Chinese EVs made by BYD.
Todd believes Australia can seal a prosperous future by embracing change and becoming a leader in clean technology innovation. In the transport sector, that change is being led by electric vehicles, even if there is only very thin support in Australia for the EV transition.
TrueGreen last month undertook a large stage one capital raising, and added a number of investors, including Nick Politis – the biggest shareholder in AP Eagers, Australia’s largest car dealership, and an institutional round of capital raising will be open to investors next month.
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