ZM Trucks CEO explains why its medium-duty ZEV is better than diesel

Jay Traugott:

I am standing here today with the CEO of ZM trucks. Joost de Vries. So what exactly do we have behind us here?

Joost de Vries:

We have a class five six work truck. That is our first model we're going to produce in the US out of five models that are coming in Fontana, California.

Jay Traugott:

Interesting. So what is powering it here? Batteries. Batteries, okay. Tell me more about the batteries. How much power do they have?

Joost de Vries:

We are 370 kilowatts and we are, peak torque is 390 TERs, so plenty of power for box trucks, work trucks. Range wise, we're looking at about 160 miles depending on how much weight you put in the back, but it's a typical box truck.

Jay Traugott:

What class is it officially? Class five and six. Five and six.

Joost de Vries:

We registered it twice because in some states you have a lot more incentive as a class six, but in other states without incentives, the insurance premium is cheaper as a class five

Jay Traugott:

Obviously.

Joost de Vries:

So you do both.

Jay Traugott:

What about for fleets who are looking into buying this and they're concerned about maintenance repairs?

Joost de Vries:

Okay. All our trucks are a hundred percent online all the time. Every truck we do worldwide is connected on a certain platform where we monitor 1500 data points in real time so fleet owners can see exactly where the truck is, their state of health, how the driver behaved. Everything that's visible in the truck is visible to the fleet owner. So we can be very predictive and preventive in our maintenance package.

Jay Traugott:

Before we go any further, if you're enjoying clean trucking news and videos, you can get more delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for our free weekly newsletter using the link in the description below. Let's take

Jay Traugott:

A look around it. Show me some of the most interesting, well

Joost de Vries:

The first thing that you see is that we have a high cap and one of the things we did with a high cap is that your CD value is better than having a low cap with one of these spoilers. The other benefits, I'm six foot four, I can stand in this cap and then we have an option for a day bed that folds back out of the back. We spend a lot of time and money on the cap and the reason is this is an electric to start with. So flat floor, you have no diesel hump anymore of a converted diesel

Jay Traugott:

Truck. No transmission tunnel. No

Joost de Vries:

Transmission tunnel is flat. The cap doesn't tilt anymore because there's no need for it anymore. There's nothing underneath there. It's an electric

Jay Traugott:

Truck. Does that make it more stable ride? Absolutely, I'll bet.

Joost de Vries:

Very comfortable driver's seat. We moved the gear selector next to the seat. So as the seat goes, you can change as you're sitting in the seat, you don't have to reach anywhere.

Jay Traugott:

So you have that dial that you, that's the dial there, which is very common in a lot of conventional pickup trucks days. Right? Exactly.

Joost de Vries:

And we also put the regenerative braking there. So if you want to play with the regenerative braking, when you go downhill, you want very heavy regenerative braking. You have all the buttons right there. So big 12 inch screen for the infotainment, everything digital on a dashboard.

Jay Traugott:

What I really like to see is that you still have the conventional buttons there for the HVAC controls and volume. Right?

Joost de Vries:

People love that. In Asia, we are buttonless are touchscreen, but in the west and in the Middle East they said I want buttons, especially in the winter when they have gloves on and it works. So we went back to buttons here in Asia, old touchscreen.

Jay Traugott:

Alright, let's take a look at the chassis here.

Joost de Vries:

So chassis packaging is modular, this is Lego. So batteries are always in the center. That means that your insurance premium goes down because they figured out if you have your batteries outboard and you have a little accident, that's $50,000 in expense. In our case, you don't have that. So batteries in the center always in the e axle, no drive shaft. So the motor is directly onto the axle itself. That means that wheel base changes becomes super simple. So you cut the frame, just move it backwards and bolt up the frame and you're good to go.

Jay Traugott:

And there's only one battery option, correct? For now,

Joost de Vries:

Today you can either have two batteries or one battery.

Jay Traugott:

Okay,

Joost de Vries:

But we have some requests for three batteries.

Jay Traugott:

I see there's extra space. There goes. There's

Joost de Vries:

Room for that, but we'll wait and see how it

Jay Traugott:

Goes. No, fair enough.

Joost de Vries:

We have made everything modular in our whole product range. So we have a bi-directional, 20 kilowatt AC charger on onboard and we also have the chargers for that for customers to use. Most of our customers have enough dwell time. They can charge during the night on AC and their investment in electricity and in panels and sit is free. They already have it, but it's also bidirectional. So you're ready to go V two G vehicle to grid. Then here you have what they call the power distribution module and what we did there as we have dual e PTOs on every, so if you want to upfit with an air conditioner, plug and play 600 volt, you're good to go.

Jay Traugott:

Have you announced pricing yet?

Joost de Vries:

No.

Jay Traugott:

When can we expect that?

Joost de Vries:

To be honest, I'm sold out for the rest of the year.

Jay Traugott:

Oh, that's not a bad problem to have.

Joost de Vries:

And only in la. Okay,

Jay Traugott:

Let's

Joost de Vries:

Be crazy. I don't think we need to mention any pricing yet. The only thing I'll say is I'm exactly at the same price where my number one competitor is.

Jay Traugott:

Thanks everybody. We'll see you next time. Be sure to leave any comments and questions in the comment section below.