Lion Electric finds buyer ahead of bankruptcy

According to Bloomberg, the insolvent Canadian commercial vehicle manufacturer Lion Electric is about to be rescued and could thus avoid liquidation that had been looming recently. A group of investors led by property magnate Vincent Chiara from Montreal will take over Lion Electric and provide new capital. The offer from Chiara and other investors still has to be approved by the court

It appears that Canadian authorities are open to the takeover, as the Quebec government has already committed to renewing a provincial program that provides substantial incentives to buyers of electric school buses. Lion is the country’s sole manufacturer of such vehicles.

Lion Electric has a fairly deep hole to climb out of, as the Bloomberg report notes: “As part of its bankruptcy filing, Lion disclosed that it owed more than $244 million to secured and non-secured creditors, according to its court-appointed monitor.”

The Canadian company’s financial troubles started in late 2023, when the company started laying off employees in North America, saying goodbye to about 10 per cent of its workforce. By the following summer, things were looking better for the commercial vehicle manufacturer, which had released a new truck model as well as secured a loan worth 7.5 million Canadian dollars. However, only one month later, another round of layoffs was announced.

By November 2024, the question was already clear whether the company would be able to survive on its own, which was followed by another round of layoffs in December 2024. Earlier this month, Lion Electric was getting ready for liquidation after the Quebec government pulled the plug on a public bailout.

Update 29 July 2025

Last week, Deloitte Restructuring sent out a notification to Lion Electric customers that the company was going to void warranties on electric school buses purchased outside of the company’s home Province of Quebec.

“For further clarification, all warranties and purchase orders in the United States were transferred into the new corporation to be bankrupted. All warranties and purchase orders that you could have with the Lion Group are therefore not being legally assumed by the company post transaction,” the company wrote.

With the warranties null and void, dozens of school districts are left hanging with stranded assets that won’t get fixed and can’t be sold to generate funds for replacements.

“We are working with alternate vendors at the expense of the school district to help keep our electric buses functional and on the road,” explained Dr. Richard Decman, Superintendent of Herscher CUSD No. 2 district in Herscher, Illinois, one of the affected school districts. “Currently, six of our 25 (Lion) electric buses need some type of repair.”

bloomberg.com, electrek.co, stnonline.com (both update)