Lordstown Endurance. Photo credit: Lordstown Motors

Lordstown Motors, an electric vehicle upstart based out of Lordstown, Ohio, has announced that it’s reached a deal to go public on the Nasdaq stock exchange via a merger with DiamondPeak Holdings, a ‘blank check’ company, or better known as special purpose acquisition company (SPAC). The merger will add roughly $675 million to Lordstown’s balance sheet and is intended to come with a valuation of $1.6 billion. The $675 million figure includes $500 million in committed investments from investors including General Motors, Fidelity, Wellington Management, and BlackRock.

Something very peculiar about Lordstown Motors is its relatively short span of existence, having been founded just a year ago. Lordstown made a splash last year by acquiring a 6.2 million-square-foot automotive manufacturing facility from automaker General Motors, which had earlier vacated the facility. The acquisition itself was unique, given that General Motors actually loaned Lordstown the sum of $40 million to purchase the factory. Soon after the purchase, Lordstown unveiled a new electric pickup named Endurance, which it intends to produce at the facility. The company debuted the pickup at an event that featured an appearance from U.S. Vice President Mike Pence. Notably, Lordstown was founded by Steve Burns, the former CEO of Workhorse Group, a publicly-traded automotive manufacturing company.

Already, Lordstown has racked up 27,000 pre-orders for the Endurance electric pickup truck, representing over $1.4 billion in potential revenue at its current price of about $53,000. For now, not much has been revealed on the specifications of the truck. As expected, Lordstown intends to put the proceeds of its planned merger towards the development of the Endurance pickup truck. The company is apparently racing alongside the likes of Tesla, Rivian, Nikola, and others to be the first to get mass-produced electric pickups into the hands of US consumers.