Following insolvency, Turkish investor buys Pepper Motion

The management consultancy Falkensteg reports that it carried out the acquisition process between the Turkish investor and Pepper Motion and specifies that the unnamed buyer will take over the company’s ‘operational capacities in Germany and the development expertise for modular electric and hydrogen drives’. Pepper Motion specialised in zero-emission drive kits for new and existing commercial vehicles, such as battery-electric drives for installation in buses and trucks as well as fuel cell drive systems, which were only recently launched in an initial small series.

According to the press release, Pepper Motion had to initiate insolvency proceedings under self-administration in February 2024. Pepper filed the corresponding application with the Ingolstadt Local Court. Founded in 2019, the company from Denkendorf reported that it ran into financial difficulties due to subdued customer demand in the core areas of e-buses and trucks, Falkensteg wrote, emphasising that a restructuring solution in the form of a “structured, international sales process” was found after just three months. The purchase by the Turkish investor is intended to bring about a strategic reorientation: Pepper Motion will address new target markets in the future and enable emission-free passenger and freight transport across the board, it says.

The last official news we received from the German electric conversion company was around six months ago in November. At the time, Pepper Motion announced that it was planning to set up a large production facility in India. The company announced at the time that a production facility for the conversion of diesel buses and trucks as well as the construction of new vehicles, including battery production of up to 20 GWh, was to be built there, and rejoiced that the ‘world’s largest production of zero-emission buses and trucks as well as battery systems outside of China’ would be established. Electric car pioneer Tesla was cited as a role model for the ‘fully integrated vertical production’.

Just a few weeks earlier, Pepper Motion had announced its intention to change the core of its business: After the company had already shifted its focus from German public transport to more customers abroad and more truck orders in May 2023, the Denkendorf-based company ended its end customer business altogether in autumn 2023 in order to become a pure technology supplier. The workforce was already ‘streamlined’ at the time. This step was justified with “the ongoing dynamics in the commercial vehicle market.” As a result, Pepper Motion stopped its own conversion of buses and lorries as well as the development of its own vehicles. Since then, the company has described itself as a ‘system supplier and strategic partner in development for manufacturers, retrofitters and special vehicle builders’.

falkensteg.com (in German)