Autonomous EV trucker Einride to go public in SPAC at $1.8 billion value

Autonomous EV transport company Einride, blank check company Legato Merger Corp. It plans to go public on the New York Stock Exchange through a SPAC deal with III valued at $1.8 billion.

The deal is expected to generate gross proceeds of $219 million, with up to an additional $100 million of PIPE capital from institutional investors, once Einride commences trading in the first half of 2026.

In announcing its plans, the Stockholm, Sweden-based company reported a contracted annual recurring revenue base of $65 million and potential long-term ARR of over $800 million.

Founded in 2016, Einride has more than 25 customers in seven countries and holds regulatory clearances in the United States and Europe. Its current fleet of approximately 200 electric vehicles is used by customers such as GE Appliances and Swedish online pharmacy company Apotea.

“Today is a defining moment for Einride and the future of transport technology,” he said.
Einride CEO Roozbeh Charli said in a statement. “We have proven the technology, built trust with global customers, and shown that autonomous and electric operations are not only possible, but better. This transaction allows us to accelerate our global expansion and continue to serve our customers with speed and precision,” said Charli, who took over as CEO from co-founder and previous CEO Robert Falck last May.

Einride has been on the CNBC Disruptor 50 list three years in a row, ranking #24 in 2025.

As a $4.6 trillion market, trucking in the U.S. and elsewhere is both carbon-intensive and inefficient, Einride estimates. Einride’s technology is designed to reduce emissions at scale and prove that electric transportation is both technologically and economically feasible.

PepsiCo is among the companies piloting the use of Einride transportation solutions in markets such as the United States, Germany and Memphis, Tennessee. Heineken adds EV shipping routes between the Netherlands and Germany in 2024 and to Austria. Einride also has plans Deploy 300 electric trucks We will travel around Europe with Mars by 2030.

To date, Einride provides transportation services for both driver-driven electric trucks and heavy-duty autonomous EV trucks. Its technology can be licensed to third parties, both for operational planning artificial intelligence software and for autonomous driving systems.

In May last year, Einride signs an agreement with DP World Deploying the largest autonomous EV fleet in the Middle East in the UAE’s major port of Jebel Ali, one of the world’s largest shipping hubs.

While most of its deals to date have been for EVs, not autonomous technology, it has celebrated one year of autonomous operations in the U.S. with GE Appliances in 2024 and has begun autonomous shipping shipments with Swedish online pharmacy company Apotea. Europe’s first daily autonomous freight services.

The US is the company’s second largest market and it plans to continue investing in the country to accelerate the deployment of its autonomous systems. Einride reported that in total, more than 1,700 hours of driverless operation, more than 11 million electric kilometers of driving and more than 350,000 shipments were made in its contracted customer operations.

“This transaction with Einride aligns with our vision of bringing industry-leading, innovative technology to public markets,” Legato’s SPAC chief Eric Rosenfeld said in the statement. “Einride’s proven customer relationships, regulatory successes and technology platform position the Company as a leader in the transformation of the transportation industry.”

It competes with autonomous trucking companies like Aurora Innovation and Disruptor Waabi, which recently hired Uber Freight CEO and founder Lior Ron as chief operating officer.

According to data from Matthew Kennedy, senior strategist at pre-IPO research provider Renaissance Capital. IPO-focused ETFsLegato Merger III raised $175 million in its February 2024 IPO ($201 million including deal total). The administration’s two previous SPACs produced Canada-based steelmaker Algoma Steel, which completed its merger with Legato I in October 2021, and Southland Holdings, an engineering and construction company, which completed its merger with Legato II in February 2023. Both stocks are currently trading below their $10 trading prices. “This is not unusual for a de-SPAC, but it highlights the overall risk of pursuing the merger we are seeing,” Kennedy said.

The SPAC market is booming this year, generating nearly 200% more revenue than at this point last year, according to data from Renaissance Capital. In terms of deal flow and revenues, this is the third-biggest year for SPACs, behind 2020 and 2021. Kennedy cites the acceleration in retail trading in technology companies, which “are the engine of SPAC merger activity.”

Transportation technology, in particular, has been a focus of SPAC mergers, including autonomous driving and electrification. Kennedy noted that SPACs in the space have had a mixed track record, including winners. Joby Aviation And quantum landscapebut there are a significant number of losers such as Nikola, Vinfast, Lilium, Vertical Aerospace, Faraday Future, Volta, Polestar, Lucid, Aeye and Canoo.

There is someone else trucking-focused SPAC deal Plus.AI and continues between Churchill Capital Corp IX.