EV freight technology company Einride has announced what feels like a match made in heaven. The autonomous and connected electric truck maker will provide sustainable, plant-based meat company Beyond Meat, with a number of electric freight vehicles to support its shipping network as part of a five-year plan to scale the sustainable operations across Beyond Meat’s entire US operations.
Einride is a freight technology company founded in Sweden in 2016 that develops electrified commercial mobility solutions and fully-autonomous Class 8 trucks.
Einride began US testing of its autonomous Pod trucks following news of its market entry stateside last fall. This also included plans for a new headquarters in New York. Additionally, it has been training Remote Pod Operators in Texas following the public introduction of its very first Pod Operator, creating an entirely new career for electrified shipping.
In addition to its autonomous Pod trucks, Einride also provides E-Trucks featuring its data-driven Saga Platform to help optimize fleets and logistics for its customers.
In 2022 alone, Einride has shared plans to deploy 200 battery electric Class 8 trucks from BYD in the US and has partnered with Danish shipping giant A.P. Moller-Maersk (aka Maersk) to further electrify the shipping segment.
Following today’s news, Einride will deliver electric trucks to Beyond Meat as well, as its latest client looks to make its shipping operations more sustainable, just like the plant-based food it sells.
Beyond Meat taps Einride to electrify its shipping network
Einride shared details of its new collaboration with Beyond Meat which includes multiple phases and a five-year plan. To begin, Einride will deploy five connected electric trucks while simultaneously providing Beyond Meat with the development, installation, and building of the charging infrastructure to support them.
By switching to Einride’s zero-emissions freight solutions, Beyond expects to reduce both its CO2 emissions and operational costs while increasing transportation capacity. Beyond Meat’s director of environment, health, and safety, Christopher Pimentel, shared the following message:
At Beyond Meat we recognize the importance of not just focusing our sustainability efforts on our products, but incorporating this mindset across our business operations as well. We are committed to optimizing the journey our products take to reach consumers’ plates to make it more sustainable, and our partnership with Einride is one of many steps we are taking to make that a reality.
The photoshopped image above from Einride appears to be one of the 200 e-trucks purchased from BYD, who currently supplies EVs for all of Einride’s US customers. That said, it’s a safe bet those five initial commercial EVs delivered under this new partnership will be that model.
At its inaugural Mesh conference this past May, Einride introduced a sleek new trailer with an integrated battery that can extend the overall range of an electric truck to over 400 miles (650 km) on a single charge.
That trailer remains a “design concept” for now, although Einride has already shared plans to eventually bring it to production with initial piloting as early as 2023. We mention it because it could someday be hauling plant-based meat for Beyond.
Especially since the company has shared a target of scaling connected e-trucks across its US operations with the help of Einride over the next five years. Niklas Reinedahl, Einride’s General Manager of North America, capped things off:
Achieving a sustainable future requires collaboration and cooperation among brands from every industry and we’re thrilled to add Beyond Meat to our growing network of U.S. companies committed to creating a clean and efficient supply chain. Working with Beyond Meat was a natural fit given our aligned efforts to offer actionable products rooted in creating a more sustainable future. By offering our services to help build a more intelligent shipping system for Beyond Meat, we’ll be able to reduce CO2 emissions.
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