Shares of autonomous-truck startup Embark Engineering Inc. sank Monday immediately after the business introduced deep layoffs and stated it may go out of company.
Embark shares
EMBK,
plunged 33%, and have fallen 97% around the past 12 months, closing Monday’s typical session at $2.56 soon after buying and selling as higher as $134 past April.
In a letter to workforce Friday that was posted on Medium, Embark co-founder and Main Govt Alex Rodrigues reported the corporation was laying off 70% of its workforce and winding down day-to-day operations.
“The funds marketplaces have turned their backs on pre-profits firms, just as slipping manufacturer timelines have delayed the prospect of scaled industrial deployment,” he wrote.
“After carefully evaluating all options, we have been not able to discover a route forward for the business enterprise in its present-day sort,” Rodrigues ongoing. “Over the following handful of weeks, we will work intently with the Embark board of directors to appraise our choices, such as marketing assets, restructuring the business or shutting down fully.”
San Francisco-based mostly Embark went community in November 2021 by a SPAC merger with a valuation of about $5.2 billion. It aimed to change the trucking market by means of self-driving application, and experienced hoped to develop a nationwide network of prolonged-haul autonomous vans.