[ad_1]
After Hertz’s disastrous venture into electric cars, CEO Stephen Shear will step down, Bloomberg mentioned. He will be replaced by former COO of GM’s robotaxi Cruise division, Jill West, who will also join the board.
A year after emerging from bankruptcy in 2020, Hertz said it would transform its car rental business by purchasing 100,000 Tesla electric vehicles. “The new Hertz will lead the way as a mobility company, starting with the largest electric vehicle rental fleet in North America,” the company said at the time. This announcement helped push Tesla’s value to a $1 trillion valuation.
Scheer joined Hertz after that decision was made, but upped Hertz’s bet on EVs by placing orders with Polestar and GM as well. The company did not purchase many electric vehicles from these automakers, but in the end, it had about 60,000 vehicles from the three automakers.
But things went sideways after that. Tesla has significantly reduced the prices of its Model 3 and Model Y electric cars. burner Resale values. Additionally, Hertz said Tesla vehicles were expensive to repair and unpopular with renters.
As a result, the company began offloading 20,000 electric vehicles, about a third of its electrified fleet. That led to a $245 million charge to Hertz and its largest quarterly loss since the pandemic. Other car rental companies have also recently abandoned electric cars, with German company Sixt getting rid of its entire fleet.
Meanwhile, West was one of nine Cruise executives fired following an accident that saw a pedestrian dragged by a Cruise after being hit by another car. authorities Accused The company withheld a video that allegedly showed the victim under her car.
[ad_2]
Source link
