UK electric vehicle start-up Arrival plans to refocus its resources on the US market as part of its business restructuring – a new e-mobility blow to the UK, Kallanish reports.

The financially-troubled company said in a security filing on 20 October that scaling production at its flagship Bicester microfactory in England requires “significant further investment” in hard tooling and working capital. Thus, it determined the benefits of such an investment “would be best directed to the US market.”

The plan is to restructure the business to concentrate resources on a “family of van products for the US market as well as its enabling technologies – including core components, composite materials, mobile robotics, and software-defined factories.” It’s unclear whether this means Arrival will no longer pursue development of its Arrival Bus and Car products at all.

The British microfactory won’t be completely ditched, as Arrival intends to continue producing a few vans to optimise microfactory processes and support trials with customers. The company says the facility has achieved many milestones and basically enabled it to prove its production strategy works.

The change of plans was announced earlier this year. It included the launch of the Charlotte microfactory in North Carolina for next year, deferring spending on its Arrival Bus programme, and postponing hard tooling for the Arrival Van. In August, Arrival had $513 million cash plus funds through a $300m At the Market Platform. Cash at the end of Q3 hovered around $330m.

To extend cash runway, the start-up plans “to further right-size the organisation and cut cash intensive activities.” This will result in a “sizable impact on the company’s global workforce, predominantly in the UK,” it adds, without disclosing figures.

Skyrocketing energy costs and the ongoing economic and political instability in the UK are seriously testing private investment commitment and, consequently, the country’s aim of a “green revolution."

Arrival says its decision is mainly based on the US’s tax credit offers of between $7,500-40,000 for commercial vehicles under its Inflation Reduction Act, as well as the “large addressable market size and substantially better margins.”