Workhorse’s first post‑Motiv earnings show revenue surge, deeper losses and a reshaped balance sheet

Workhorse Group’s name is still on the stock ticker. But the financial report the company filed March 31 shows how much has changed behind it.

First earnings report after the Motiv merger

In its first earnings release since completing a merger with Motiv Electric Trucks late last year, the commercial electric vehicle maker reported sharply higher revenue and vehicle deliveries for 2025, alongside wider losses and continued negative gross margins. The numbers offer the first detailed look at a business that is now, in accounting terms, largely Motiv in a Workhorse shell.

The Detroit-dated release, furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission in a Form 8-K signed by Chief Financial Officer Robert M. Ginnan, covers the quarter and year ended Dec. 31, 2025. Under U.S. accounting rules, California-based Motiv is treated as the acquirer in a reverse acquisition, even though Workhorse is the legal surviving entity. That means Motiv’s results form the historical baseline, with Workhorse’s operations folded in only after the Dec. 15 closing of the deal.

Quarterly results: sales up, losses widen

For the fourth quarter, Workhorse reported net sales of $9.7 million, up 64% from roughly $6 million in the same period a year earlier. The company delivered 65 vehicles in the quarter.

It also posted a net loss of $23.7 million, or $2.46 per share, compared with a loss of $19.6 million, or $2.10 per share, a year before. The quarter included about $4.9 million in merger-related costs for legal, banking and other fees.

Full-year 2025: deliveries more than double

For all of 2025, Workhorse said it generated $21.2 million in revenue, up 201% from $7 million in 2024, and delivered 112 vehicles, more than double the 46 units reported for 2024.

The company recorded a full-year net loss of $64.1 million, wider than the prior year’s $51.6 million loss. Cash used in operations totaled $35.6 million.

On a pro forma basis that combines Motiv’s results with Workhorse’s pre-merger revenue, management said the business would have generated $34 million in 2025 revenue, up from $13.7 million in 2024—an increase of 149%. Pro forma fourth-quarter sales would have been $13.8 million.

Negative gross margins persist

Even with that growth, the combined company is still selling trucks at a loss. Cost of sales for 2025 totaled $30.8 million, resulting in a gross loss of $9.6 million. Operating expenses were $37.9 million, leaving a loss from operations of $47.4 million.

Chief Executive Scott Griffith, who leads the combined company from the Detroit area headquarters, framed the results as a turning point.

“Today’s results mark a milestone for Workhorse as our first earnings report as a combined company following our merger with Motiv Electric Trucks,” Griffith said in the release.

Griffith said the company had “made meaningful progress” on integration, product expansion and strengthening its financial position.

He said Workhorse now has more than 1,100 vehicles deployed and more than 20 million real-world miles logged across its trucks, shuttles and buses. He pointed to a new Cycle Plan and product roadmap that includes developing a proprietary Class 5/6 cab-chassis platform aimed at what he called a $23 billion U.S. market for Class 4–6 commercial trucks.

Griffith said the company believes it has “a clear and achievable path to profitability,” while stressing the need to convert its pipeline into revenue, manage costs during integration and “continue to pursue financing options to bolster our balance sheet.”

Balance sheet: a major reset

The balance sheet accompanying the 8-K illustrates the scale of the change. As of Dec. 31, 2025, Workhorse reported total assets of $117.9 million, up from $37.4 million a year earlier. Cash and cash equivalents rose to $12.9 million from $6.6 million, while inventory nearly doubled to $39.1 million. Property, plant and equipment jumped to $22.5 million from $2.1 million, reflecting, among other items, the inclusion of Workhorse’s Union City, Indiana manufacturing facility.

At the same time, total liabilities declined slightly to $74.9 million from $78.2 million. A large senior secured promissory note that appeared on the 2024 balance sheet as a $68.4 million current liability is gone.

Additional paid-in capital climbed to $362.1 million from $214.1 million, and stockholders’ equity swung from a deficit of $40.8 million at the end of 2024 to positive equity of $43 million at the end of 2025.

New obligations and financing facilities

The new structure comes with fresh obligations. The company listed a $10 million “cash flow credit agreement” with a related party as long-term debt, $5.4 million in related-party convertible notes and a $6.1 million current liability tied to stock rights.

In the release, Workhorse said it has established a $40 million “customer order lending facility” to help finance working capital for new truck orders, and disclosed that $10 million of that facility had been drawn.

Deal rationale—and a shift in control

The merger with Motiv, announced in August 2025 and closed on Dec. 15, 2025, was pitched as a way to create a stronger contender in the medium-duty commercial EV segment. Motiv brought a software-centric electric powertrain platform and a track record supplying Class 4–6 trucks and buses to fleets and public-sector customers, especially in incentive-rich states such as California. Workhorse contributed its Union City plant, dealer and service network and public listing on the Nasdaq Capital Market.

The deal also shifted control of the company. Motiv’s lead investor now effectively holds a majority stake on a fully diluted basis, reshaping governance and diluting existing shareholders.

Shortly after the merger was announced, law firm Monteverde & Associates said it was investigating whether Workhorse’s board breached fiduciary duties in agreeing to the transaction. The investigation has not, to date, produced a public lawsuit.

Integration plans and a familiar test for EV startups

The company is targeting $20 million in annualized cost synergies as it exits 2026, primarily from eliminating duplicate corporate functions, consolidating manufacturing in Indiana and streamlining its supply chain. It expects to finish integrating processes and systems over the next two to three quarters.

Workhorse’s latest pivot comes after a decade of reinventions and setbacks. The company, which evolved from an electric-vehicle conversion firm that acquired the Workhorse chassis brand, once bid for the U.S. Postal Service’s next-generation mail truck contract and briefly pursued an electric pickup before licensing that program to Lordstown Motors. It has struggled to achieve consistent production, cycled through strategies and management teams, and leaned heavily on new capital to fund operations.

The broader market into which the combined Workhorse and Motiv are pushing has grown more crowded and more volatile. Medium-duty commercial EVs—the Class 4–6 trucks and buses used for local delivery, shuttles and municipal services—are a focus for regulators seeking to cut urban air pollution and greenhouse-gas emissions. Generous state-level incentives in some jurisdictions can offset a large portion of an electric truck’s upfront cost. At the same time, startup manufacturers have faced rising costs, supply-chain disruptions and competition from incumbent original equipment makers, some of which are rolling out their own electric models.

Within that environment, the company’s deployed base of more than 1,100 vehicles and its millions of accumulated electric miles could be an asset with customers and regulators, particularly if its data show strong reliability and lower lifetime operating costs. But its financial results underscore that scale alone has not yet translated into profitability.

Workhorse’s 8-K includes an extensive section on forward-looking statements, warning that its plans are subject to risks including the need to raise additional capital, the possibility that expected synergies from the Motiv merger may not be realized, challenges associated with consolidating and ramping up production, potential changes in EV incentives and environmental regulations, and the company’s ability to maintain compliance with Nasdaq listing standards.

Those cautions frame the company’s next phase. After stripping out an old debt burden and bolting on a new product platform, Workhorse now faces a familiar test for young EV manufacturers: whether it can move from dozens of vehicles per quarter to sustained, profitable volume before its cash—and its ability to tap new funding—runs thin.