Green Automotive Company announced it has closed the acquisition of Liberty Electric Cars Ltd. following its announcement on June 29th of the signing of a definitive agreement to acquire the Liberty business.
The combined businesses will now have operations in North America, Europe and Australasia and will continue to expand through a combination of organic growth and targeted acquisitions.
Commenting on the acquisition, Fred Luke, President of Green Automotive, said: “We’re delighted to have closed this acquisition, which I believe will accelerate our growth as the Liberty management team has state-of-the-art EV technology that would have take us another year or longer to develop. What they’ve achieved in Europe has been quite remarkable and we expect their combination of technical excellence and industry knowledge to help give us an edge in this fast growing business. In particular, access to their expertise in conversion programs will help to accelerate our plans to have pure electric buses, shuttles and limos on the road in the very near future.”
Liberty, formed in 2006, was the first company in the world to successfully convert the Range Rover into a high speed pure electric 4×4 capable of 200 miles on a single charge and driven by 4 individual motors.
The Liberty Electric Range Rover was hailed as the world’s best luxury EV in 2010 and provided the most telling example of the company’s capabilities. Liberty’s expertise will serve as Green Automotive’s foundation for its expansion into the European Electric Vehicle market as well as provide the technology for the conversion activities planned for the North American market.
Liberty, through its E-Tech division, is involved in a number of advanced research programs for developing next generation EV solutions, many in partnership with Tier 1 automotive manufacturers. These include the prestigious “Deliver” project where Liberty is working together with Volkswagen, Fiat and Michelin to develop a pure electric commercial vehicle. In addition the “Motore” project in which Liberty is partnered with Cranfield University, Rolls Royce Electric Machines and Protean aims to develop a “rare earth” free electric motor technology. Moreover Liberty’s engineers have invented, IP-protected, innovative electric vehicle (EV) drive train technologies, that can be employed in a wide variety of vehicle platforms (trucks, buses, 4×4, SUV, MPV and pickup trucks) as reveled in its flagship technology demonstrator, the Liberty E-Range — the worlds first, pure electric, luxury 4×4.
Liberty, through its E-Care division, has pioneered the creation of after sales support for Electric Vehicles, by providing the most comprehensive maintenance program throughout Europe for electric trucks and cars. This E-Care service delivers properly trained, highly skilled engineers equipped with new and unique diagnostic tools; experience in safe intervention for high voltage systems and access to the right parts to affect quality repairs. Liberty’s E-Care clients include UPS, FedEx, Navistar, Veolia, Tesco and many more.
