Walmart orders at least 4,500 Canoo electric cars to be used for last-mile delivery

Citing a report from Consumer News and Business Channel, on July 12, local time in the United States,electric vehiclestartup Canno said that Walmart in the United States has signed a "final agreement" to buy at least 4,500 vehicles and up to 10,000 all-electric lifestyle vehicles. Delivery Vans - Small electric vans designed for local delivery services.The deal will help U.S. electric vehicle startup Canoo out of trouble.

Canoo is one of several U.S. electric vehicle startups to go public through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC).Shares of the company briefly surged above $20 after debuting on the stock market in late 2020, but have fallen since co-founder and CEO Ulrich Kranz left last year.Shares of Canno jumped more than 50% on the news that Canoo would supply vans to Walmart, and the stock was trading at $3.63 a share as of Tuesday's close.

Terms of the agreement were not disclosed, but it is understood that Walmart will initially use some pre-production electric vehicles to deliver online orders.Canoo will use this as a test bed to refine and finalize vehicle configurations in the coming weeks.The lifestyle delivery vehicle, or LDV, will be built at its Oklahoma factory and is expected to enter production in the fourth quarter of 2022 and hit the road in 2023.

InHome

Walmart relies on its thousands of stores to offer online shopping at a faster cost and compete with online rival Amazon, known for its speed.It has launched and expanded e-commerce services, including, which delivers groceries directly to customers' refrigerators, and Express, which delivers purchases to shoppers' doorsteps in two hours or less.is also a key perk of Walmart+, the annual membership service the big-box retailer hopes to grow.But to expand those services, it needs more delivery vans.

The signing of Walmart's agreement with Canoo marks the third major electric van deal Walmart has signed.Earlier this year, Walmart ordered 5,000 electric vans from General Motors subsidiary BrightDrop and also bought 1,100 electric vans from Ford E-Transit, some of which are already in operation.

Walmart plans to use the three companies' electric vans for InHome and other local deliveries.It intends to increase InHome availability from 6 million to 30 million by the end of this year.