Lordstown Motors founder and former CEO Steve Burns is buying back the company’s assets out of bankruptcy for $10 million. Burns’ intentions were highlighted in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
“On September 29, 2023, the Selling Entities entered into an Asset Purchase Agreement with LAS Capital and Mr. Stephen S. Burns, an individual, as guarantor of certain obligations of LAS Capital under the Asset Purchase Agreement.
“Mr. Burns, whom the Selling Entities understand is the majority equity holder of LAS Capital, was the founder and former Chief Executive Officer and a member of the board of directors of the Company,” the SEC filing noted.
Lordstown was once considered one of the rising stars of the electric vehicle sector, with its Endurance all-electric pickup truck being announced with 100,000 supposed pre-orders. This, however, was challenged by Hindenburg Research, which alleged that the company was inflating the Endurance’s pre-orders.
Burns ultimately resigned as CEO in 2021 after an internal investigation found that he did inflate order estimates for the Endurance. Fellow executive Julio Rodriguez, who was serving as Lordstown’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at the time, also left the company.
It remains to be seen what assets Burns will be acquiring from Lordstown, as the company’s plant complex is owned by Foxconn, as noted in a Freightwaves report. As per the SEC filing, however, Burns’ entity LAS Capital “agreed to acquire specified assets of the selling entities related to the design, production and sale of electric light duty vehicles focused on the commercial fleet market.”
Guidehouse Insights principal analyst Sam Abuelsamid noted that Lordstown will still be unable to recover despite Burns’ recent moves. “It’s just as doomed as ever. I have no more confidence that Lordstown will gain any market traction than I did yesterday… There’s only soft tooling there. Maybe they could build a couple hundred more trucks, but that’s it. And nobody’s going to buy them,” the analyst noted.
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