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EV startup Canoo has lost its chief financial officer and its head lawyer, the latest in a string of executive departures as the company continues to struggle to find mass adoption of its electric work vans.
CFO Greg Ethridge and general counsel Hector Ruiz both resigned from Canoo on October 31, the company announced Tuesday in a regulatory filing. Ethridge and Ruiz did not respond to requests for comment.
Canoo also announced it has furloughed 30 workers in Oklahoma for 12 weeks “as part of a broader realignment of its North American operations.”
Ethridge has been replaced by former investment banker Kunal Bhalla, who has been chief of staff to CEO Tony Aquila. Bhalla will make a base salary of $300,000. Associate general counsel Sean Yan will replace Ruiz.
The departures come just a few weeks after Canoo closed its original headquarters in Los Angeles, California in order to prioritize its operations in Texas and Oklahoma. The last remaining co-founder left the company around the same time, as did Canoo’s chief technology officer.
Canoo has been struggling financially as of late. The company reported around $19 million in total cash as of June 30, 2024, $4.5 million of which was unrestricted. In October, Canoo revealed in a regulatory filing that a fund connected to Aquila loaned the startup around $1.2 million at an 11% interest rate. On Tuesday, the company announced in the same regulatory filing that it has borrowed another $2.7 million from Aquila’s fund. Canoo has also entered into a revolving credit facility with Aquila’s fund.
Canoo is also facing multiple lawsuits from suppliers alleging unpaid bills, as TechCrunch previously reported. Another supplier, Kistler Instrument Corporation, has since filed a lawsuit against Canoo as well in Los Angeles Superior Court seeking $56,000 in damages.
Sean O’Kane is a reporter who has spent a decade covering the rapidly-evolving business and technology of the transportation industry, including Tesla and the many startups chasing Elon Musk. Most recently, he was a reporter at Bloomberg News where he helped break stories about some of the most notorious EV SPAC flops. He previously worked at The Verge, where he also covered consumer technology, hosted many short- and long-form videos, performed product and editorial photography, and once nearly passed out in a Red Bull Air Race plane.
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