Amazon-backed Slate reveals bare-bones £20k EV pick-up for US

New American EV manufacturer Slate, backed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has revealed a back-to-basics compact pick-up truck that's set to cost the equivalent of just £20,000.

The secretive start-up had not made any public announcements about its debut model, called simply Truck, in the run-up to its unveiling but it is now taking reservations and plans to begin deliveries at the end of next year - with a targeted base price of $27,000 before local incentives.

Confirmed for only a US roll-out so far, the utilitarian two-seat pick-up is engineered and designed to keep costs down in a bid to make electric motoring affordable and more appealing in a market that continues to heavily favour combustion propulsion.

Its monolithic, composite-panelled silhouette is unadorned with chrome and unnecessary decorations, for example, while the windows are manually cranked and there's a smartphone mount in place of a central touchscreen, à la Citroën Ami. Speakers can be fitted as an option, though, and standard kit includes a USB port, central locking and cruise control.

The Truck is highly customisable, though, with a raft of colours, accessories and kits on offer. It can even be converted into a five-seat baby SUV or a fastback crossover using bolt-on conversion kits for the 1047-litre load bay, supplied by Slate.

Power is provided by either a 52.7kWh or relatively large 84.3kWh battery under the floor, which are said to return ranges of either 150 or 240 miles and can each fast-charge from 20-100% in less than 30 minutes. 

Propulsion comes courtesy of a single motor on the rear axle, giving 201bhp and 195lb ft for a 0-60mph time of 8.0sec and a top speed of 90mph.

Slate will build the Truck at a site in the Midwestern US, so it will not be subject to president Donald Trump's new 25% import tariffs on foreign-made cars, but the firm has not named a location, nor said whether it plans to build the EV itself.