Slate Auto, which got here out of stealth mode earlier this 12 months with a stunning – and surprisingly reasonably priced – customizable electrical truck, has raised $700 million up to now.
However lengthy earlier than the EV startup broke cowl, it quietly raised a Collection A spherical of greater than $100 million in 2023. And whereas Jeff Bezos was concerned in that spherical, as TechCrunch initially reported, he was not alone. A regulatory submitting submitted to the Securities and Change Fee exhibits as many as 16 buyers have been concerned.
Slauson & Co., a Los Angeles enterprise agency that launched 5 years in the past, is among the few buyers in Slate’s Collection A to talk publicly about why they backed the corporate.
Slauson & Co. accomplice Ajay Relan informed TechCrunch in an unique interview his agency is properly conscious of the various EV startup bankruptcies which have occurred lately, in addition to the headwinds coming from the Trump administration for something inexperienced energy-related.
Regardless, Relan stated he and his accomplice Austin Clements consider within the startup’s mission of offering “extra reasonably priced, dependable, and customizable automobiles which can be domestically manufactured.”
Relan and Clements began Slauson & Co. in 2020. Pals since highschool, they each grew up off of Slauson Avenue in South Central Los Angeles, which Relan wryly categorized as being “not essentially identified for its tech and enterprise capital innovation.”
“However it undoubtedly is a supply of cultural capital that will get repackaged and distributed to extra developed areas and different elements of the world,” Relan stated. Slauson & Co.’s mission is to bridge the hole between these two worlds by funding and empowering individuals who have “traditionally simply not had their perspective represented within the innovation financial system.”
Relan stated they bought turned on to Slate by Jeff Wilkie, the previous Amazon shopper division CEO who co-founded Re:Construct Manufacturing, an incubator that Slate spun out of. Wilkie, who Relan has identified since earlier than founding Slauson & Co, first launched them to the secretive venture in 2023.
Relan admits investing in an EV startup is a bit exterior of his agency’s “major themes.” However the duo was intrigued by Slate’s mission to make a extra reasonably priced and approachable automobile.
He was bought on the enterprise after Wilkie launched Slauson & Co. to the Slate crew.
The startup was nonetheless only a few dozen individuals in early 2023. However these individuals had a long time of expertise within the automotive trade. CEO Chris Barman spent greater than 20 years at Chrysler, working automobile line packages, main the Android Automotive integration, and even collaborating with Waymo. Chairman Rodney Copes and chief monetary officer Ryan Inexperienced spent years at Harley-Davidson and Rivian.
Barman significantly impressed the Slauson & Co. companions.
“She has nice imaginative and prescient. She has a fantastic status inside the firm she’s labored for earlier than,” Clements stated. “She’s no frills, not concerning the hype. She’s actually about delivering.”
Clements stated he and Relan additionally rely closely on style on the subject of early-stage investing.
“Do we expect that that is one thing that resonates with what individuals are on the lookout for at this level?” he stated. “The concept there are not any reasonably priced automobiles, significantly for younger individuals, however actually for everyone, and simply the mismatch between affordability of automobiles and what’s accessible simply didn’t make sense.”
Slate’s truck received’t hit the market till late 2026, however Relan and Clements have already got a bit of validation that their eye for style was spot on with Slate: The corporate handed 100,000 refundable reservations in simply two weeks.
After all, it doesn’t harm to be standing alongside some critical monetary and industrial firepower. Not solely did Bezos put money into that preliminary funding spherical, however Slate additionally courted massive cash from Los Angeles Dodgers proprietor Mark Walter in addition to VC agency Basic Catalyst. (“The companions they have been in a position to convey alongside for the journey earlier than and after us have been icing on the cake,” Reman stated in an e-mail.)
These backers have helped fill Slate’s coffers to the tune of round $700 million, and the corporate informed TechCrunch that it’s already began on a Collection C funding spherical. Slauson & Co. additionally invested within the Collection B; the agency declined to share how a lot it has invested in Slate up to now.
This mixture – the Slate crew, the most important backers, and the chance on the entry degree of the automobile market – left Relan and Clements believing their funding can generate a very good return, even within the notoriously low-margin auto enterprise.
“We’ve got to have some deep conviction that that is one thing that might drive very actual returns within the fund,” Clements stated, earlier than including with fun: “You recognize, we’re not only a purely philanthropic group.”
