Partnership Investor - EVI truck plant grows/The Record

By Reed Fujii
Record Staff Writer
February 02, 2012 12:00 AMSTOCKTON - Electric Vehicles International is expanding its Stockton assembly plant and has opened a Michigan office to support national marketing and sales efforts, company officials announced this week.

A visit to the plant on Army Court north of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard revealed computerized machine tools being installed and a 30,000-square-foot plant expansion being readied for an assembly line where EVI will produce electric-powered, walk-in vans for delivery giant UPS.

"It's really a work in progress over the next 60 to 90 days," said Robert Falcon, EVI's general manager.

He expects to see 70 to 75 workers employed at the plant by the end of that period, compared with the roughly 40 now on staff.

"We made a commitment to increase our production capacity and modernize our plant and bring in more people," said Frank Jenkins, EVI's vice president of sales and marketing. "We're doing that."

At about $178,000 apiece, according to government reports, the 100 electric vans EVI will produce for UPS cost nearly three times what conventional delivery vans fetch. A good portion of the difference is being made up by government incentives, aimed at curbing air pollution, reducing carbon releases to the atmosphere and stimulating the economy.

"We need incentives to help us sell the vehicles," Jenkins said.

But that investment is helping jump-start the electric vehicle industry and, in particular, boosting production and development of batteries, which should eventually lead to lower prices.

Forecasters predict battery costs will drop 50 percent over the next five years, Jenkins said.

"We will get to where we need to be where we don't need the incentives anymore," he said.

Jenkins is also helping oversee the development of the new EVI office in Michigan, which will help extend the company's reach, particularly to the East Coast and Midwest, as well as provide insight into the latest developments in the nation's automotive hub.

Besides the walk-in delivery van, privately held EVI offers a wide range of electric vehicles, including medium-duty trucks, small utility trucks and multipassenger resort vehicles.

Jenkins said it is also starting development of a new hybrid truck based on a Ford F-550 chassis. The drive train would be fully electric, with a fossil fuel-electric generator to keep its batteries charged.

The promise there is the fuel efficiency of an electric motor but with the range of a gas or diesel engine.

Contact reporter Reed Fujii at (209) 546-8253 or rfujii@recordnet.com.