All the assets of Aldergrove-based Vicinity Motor Corporation will be auctioned off piecemeal, after a court-appointed receiver decided against selling them together.
A report posted online by FTI Consulting, the receiver and manager, said a public invitation for offers to purchase generated 10 offers, two "en bloc" to buy everything.
FTI determined the "highest cumulative proceeds" would result from an offer by the McDougall auction firm, which included a net minimum guarantee, the amount of which which was redacted from the report.
The auction will be scheduled to "close by the end of May 2025," the report said.
A list of assets to be auctioned off includes dozens of commercial trucks and transit buses built by VMC, almost all electric, as well as parts, tools and office equipment.
Vicinity is based in a 32,000-sq.-ft. facility, on 2.5 acres in Aldergrove, that includes the corporate headquarters and an assembly plant. It also owns a 鈥渂uy America compliant鈥� vehicle assembly facility in Ferndale, Wash.
Creditors will also benefit from a recent U.S. arbitration award 鈥� attached to the FTI report 鈥� that refunds most of the $15 million Vicinity paid Optimal Electric Vehicles, a Michigan-based company, in 2021 to have them make electric shuttle buses for the Canadian company.
Optimal said the buses were production-ready, and government-certified, but VMC sued for breach of contract saying the buses were overweight and could not be certified, demanding a refund of $12 million.
In a Jan. 23 decision that cited a "multitude of failures" by Optimal, an arbitration panel in Michigan ruled in favour of VMC, awarding $12 million plus $996,046.60 in interest.
When it was forced into receivership, Vicinity owed $69 million, half of it to the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) and Export Development Canada (EDC), and the rest to a long list of foreign and domestic businesses.
A tally of creditors published by FTI shows Vicinity Motor Corp owed $22.4 million to the bank and $11.9 million to EDC, the federal agency that provides assistance to Canadian companies trying to expand into international markets.
Both are the only secured creditors listed, meaning they have the right to be paid before any of the others on the list.
Originally called Grande West, the company was formed in 2008 to meet a request for smaller and mid-size buses from BC Transit by building a low floor, heavy-duty, mid-sized model.
B.C. Transit currently has 190 Vicinity buses in service throughout the province.
Vicinity was delisted by the U.S.-based NASDAQ stock exchange, after its shares fell below the minimum bid price requirement of $1.
It was one of two delisting orders from NASDAQ, the other in response to the company going into receivership.
As well, cease trade orders were issued against Vicinity, including one from the British Columbia Securities Commission.
