We have seen this brand in Australia before, but now there are new electric trucks on offer from Foton. There have been two previous introductions, by two different importers, to introduce Foton into Australia, with a conventional diesel light duty truck. Both had limited penetration.
However, now Foton Mobility has come in, with a product which is reckoned to offer the right specification for Australian light duty truck buyers.
This time around the offering is purely electric powered and moving into a market segment with a limited number of players and not many of them with a strong history in Australia. This is an opportunity to make better progress than in the past, into a market which is searching for new zero emission product to satisfy its larger corporate clients and their low carbon expectations.
Early on in the piece Foton was branding the new range under the iBlue banner, but that has since been dropped in favour of the more simple Foton Mobility. The truck on test was the Foton T5 Electric Truck with a pantech body and a one tonne load. The larger trucks will be classified as T6 in medium duty and T10 in heavy duty.
Going Forward
The demand for these trucks means that most of the trucks being brought into Australia are already sold to a customer as they arrive on the wharf. A number of the big corporate and some government contracts are making up the majority of sales.
There are also vans and 14 tonne medium duty trucks on the way from Foton, this year. Then we can expect heavier trucks on the way next year using the Toyota hydrogen fuel cell to generate electricity to power the truck.
There are dealers in the major cities around Australia. the company has partnered with Energy Australia to help potential customer understand the infrastructure, both needed as possible at specific sites. Foton can also supply DC and AC chargers, through Green Charge.
The chargers at Foton’s facility in Smeaton Grange are 140kW DC which is will charge the T5 in one hour. The AC chargers that they supply can recharge overnight, but can take about six hours to charge the truck up in a typical environment.
These trucks are Foton’s chance to get ahead before the point, two years time, when there’s going to be other options from the major players in light duty. The company’s aim is to a be a credible member of any truck buyer’s EV shopping list by that time.
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