“Non-gearheads” now have the prospect to design their very own automobiles.
Final month, a picture appeared on Reddit of an unidentifiable small truck in a car parking zone in Los Angeles. The sighting was first famous by Carscoops simply after TechCrunch reported that Jeff Bezos was making an “reasonably priced” car via a “secretive EV startup” known as Slate Auto.
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Web sleuths shortly put collectively (and TechCrunch confirmed) that the truck within the Reddit picture was the precise Slate Auto idea automobile.
Now, the corporate is prepared for reservations, and personalization is essential. Every part is customizable, from the outside look to the colour to the inside knobs.
“We expect everybody ought to be capable of personalize their automobile,” the web site says. “However autos aren’t constructed to be personalized by non-gearheads (we love you, gearheads). So, we modified that.”
Supplied by Slate Auto
In a video asserting the brand new “radically easy, radically reasonably priced Slate truck” on X, CEO Chris Barman mentioned the value begins within the “mid 20s,” although it is going to be nearer to $20,000 (after federal EV tax credit). The one-cab electrical truck is ready to be delivered to prospects in late 2026. The corporate is primarily based in Troy, Michigan.
The folks spoke. We constructed. Meet the radically easy, radically reasonably priced Slate. Reserve yours at https://t.co/Y5RkOIFCRo pic.twitter.com/uvSZVpdkWv
— Slate Auto (@slateauto) April 25, 2025
“There is a huge inhabitants of individuals on the market in terms of protected, dependable, reasonably priced transportation; there simply actually aren’t many options for them,” CEO Chris Barman advised Enterprise Insider forward of the official unveiling.
Associated: The ‘Secretive’ Electrical Automobile Reasonably priced Truck Was Simply Noticed in Los Angeles
A method the corporate is protecting it reasonably priced is thru its customization choices. For instance, the vans are wrapped, not painted, and will be modified at a buyer’s whim.
“With different automobiles, you choose your colour while you purchase it, and that is it,” the web site says. “With a Slate, you may choose your colour each time—and alter it each time. It is the primary car of its sort designed to be simply wrapped.”
Wrap kits will begin round $500, in accordance with the corporate. (Although protecting it the easy grey—as per the Reddit reveal—will nonetheless stand out.)
What is that this automobile?
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Amazon founder Bezos, Mark Walter (Los Angeles Dodgers majority proprietor and CEO of Guggenheim Companions), and investor Thomas Tull have helped the brand new automobile firm increase a minimum of $111 million, per TechCrunch.
NBC studies that, in accordance with a doc filed with the Securities and Change Fee, Melinda Lewison, the pinnacle of Bezos’ household workplace, is the brand new Slate Auto director.
