Lion Electric's customers worried about what comes next amid company's struggles

A LionC fully electric school bus is seen at an event promoting the Greening Government Fund, which provides funding to federal departments and agencies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in their operations, in Ottawa, on Tuesday, June 27, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang

MONTREAL — Andrew Brooks ordered three school buses from Lion Electric Co. on Nov. 20, just before American Thanksgiving.

As superintendent of a school district in Illinois, Brooks had been working with the Quebec-based electric-vehicle maker for more than a year to apply for U.S. federal grant money to buy the electric buses. He didn’t realize the company was in financial trouble until after the holiday, in early December.

That’s when he reached out to his contact at Lion Electric, only to discover he’d been laid off. “Had we known … then we probably would have held off on sending those orders through,” he said in an interview.

Now Brooks is one of many clients in the U.S. and Canada waiting to see what Lion Electric’s future will mean for their own efforts to electrify their fleets. Some have taken steps to distance themselves from the struggling manufacturer, while others are worried about whether their buses will still get the maintenance they need.

A flagship of Quebec’s mission to become an electric-vehicle powerhouse, Lion Electric’s star has fallen fast in recent months. The company, which builds electric school buses and trucks, entered creditor protection in December after going through several rounds of layoffs last year and shutting down production at a plant in Joliet, Ill. With US$500 million in debt, it is now seeking a buyer with a restructuring plan to focus solely on buses and return all manufacturing to Quebec.

Lion Electric has been one of the major players in the push to electrify school buses in Canada and the U.S. The company says it has about 2,200 electric vehicles on the road and a 33 per cent market share of electric school buses across North America, with deliveries in 28 states and six provinces.

But now, some of its customers are worried. In Prince Edward Island, the government recently cancelled a public tender to purchase 12 new electric buses, and the province’s pledge to fully electrify its school bus fleet by 2030 seems to be in doubt.

The tender “was cancelled as there was only one bid, and due to the uncertainty of the Lion Electric Company’s future, the province elected to not pursue the purchase of more electric buses at this time,” said Vicki Tse, a spokesperson for P.E.I.‘s Education Department, in an email.

P.E.I. already has 107 electric buses, making up nearly one-third of the 357 buses in its fleet — the highest proportion of any province in Canada, according to Miriam Ponette, a co-ordinator of the Canadian Electric School Bus Alliance. Ponette said all of P.E.I.‘s electric buses are from Lion.

Tse didn’t directly respond to a question about whether the province still plans to electrify its fleet by 2030. “While the news from Lion Electric does not support the net-zero goal to electrify its entire school bus fleet, we are confident that manufacturers will continue to invest in and expand the production of electric school buses in the coming years,” she said.

There are currently about 1,900 electric school buses on the road in Canada, Ponette said. The vast majority are in Quebec, which offers grants for electric school bus purchases. The federal government also offers funding for operators to buy electric buses, but Ponette said the program has been slow to get money out the door.

Lion has pointed to the slow rollout of federal subsidies as one of the major challenges it’s been facing.

Back in Illinois, Brooks said his school district is locked into its order while Lion Electric is in creditor protection. If the company can’t find a buyer, then he’ll look for another supplier. “It’s sad for them,” he said.

Brooks’s district is one of many across the U.S. that have started electrifying their fleets thanks to a federal program that offers funding for districts to swap out diesel buses for electric models. The clean school bus program includes US$5 billion over five years to replace existing buses, and Lion Electric has been one of the main beneficiaries.

The Quebec company had about 1,600 electric school buses on the road in the U.S. in December 2023, according to the Washington, D.C.-based World Resources Institute, with about 1,800 more on order. Those numbers are higher than its two main competitors, Blue Bird Corporation and Thomas Built Buses, according to the institute’s data.

In some of the districts already using Lion Electric buses, officials are waiting to see what a possible sale of the company will mean for them. Richard Decman, superintendent of a rural Illinois school district south of Chicago, said they’ve been running 25 Lion Electric buses since last summer — about half their fleet. One of the reasons his district chose Lion is because of its manufacturing plant in Joliet, just a short drive away.

But Lion closed that plant in December, and it’s been taking longer to get replacement parts since that happened, Decman said. He’s worried about whether the warranties on his buses will carry over if the company is sold. “That’s just our biggest concern,” he said.

Lion Electric has laid off most of its employees, with the remaining 160 focused on helping clients with vehicle maintenance, the company says.

Decman said he’s been happy with the performance of the buses so far, and has had only minor maintenance issues. But in some other areas, it hasn’t been smooth sailing.

Andrew Dolloff, superintendent of the Yarmouth School Department in Maine, said his district bought two Lion Electric buses in 2023 using federal grant money. To date, he said, they’ve been on the road for less than a month combined.

Dolloff said the buses frequently display messages indicating heating, electrical or battery problems, forcing the district to pull them out of service. It can take weeks or months to get someone from the company to visit the area and fix the issue, he said.

“We’re relying on one individual from Lion to service this region, and they’ve had a difficult time providing that person,” he said. “There’s just been a lot of turnover.”

Dolloff hopes the problems are just “a bump in the road,” and said he’s still trying to work with the company. “I’m not sure if this particular model was ready for prime time, but certainly our experience has been that they’re not ready for our students,” he said.

In P.E.I., drivers have also complained to local media about problems with Lion Electric buses, including issues with their heaters and lower-than-expected range.

In more bad news for the company, one of its buses caught fire in Huntsville, Ont., on Monday, though no injuries were reported. Dean Campbell, owner of the local company that operated the bus, said Lion Electric is investigating the cause, but he said the batteries were not involved. He said his company has been using the bus since 2018, with “satisfactory service.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 15, 2025.