NFI presents at White House Roundtable focused on strengthening U.S. bus manufacturing and clean transit deployment

Roundtable followed by release of U.S. FTA Dear Colleague letter and notice of $1.5 billion of federal funding to modernize bus fleets

ST. CLOUD, Minn., Feb. 09, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- (TSX: NFI, OTC: NFYEF, TSX: NFI.DB) NFI Group Inc. (“NFI” or “the Company”), a leading independent bus and coach manufacturer and a leader in electric mass mobility solutions, is proud to announce that Paul Soubry, NFI’s President and Chief Executive Officer, and Jennifer McNeill, Vice President, Public Sales and Marketing for subsidiaries New Flyer and MCI, presented at a Clean Bus Manufacturing Roundtable (“Roundtable”) at the White House in Washington, DC on February 7, 2024.

The White House in coordination with the Federal Transit Administration (“FTA”) and the American Public Transportation Association (“APTA”), convened the Roundtable focused on ensuring U.S. domestic manufacturing capacity to deliver clean transit buses is at the scale and pace needed to meet market demand and achieve national climate and equity goals.

The collaborative discussion centered on the financial and operational impacts supply disruption, inflation, and vehicle customization has had on U.S. transit bus manufacturers, leading to a number of recent exits by market competitors, impacting total production capacity.

Key recommendations from APTA’s Bus Manufacturing Task Force (“Task Force”) and the FTA’s Transit Vehicle Innovation Deployment Centers (“TVIDC”) Program were presented, along with actions taken by the FTA to educate and encourage funding grantees on use of procurement best practices and resources available from the Biden-Harris Administration to support manufacturers.

APTA’s Task Force, assembled in late 2023 under the leadership of Dorval R. Carter, Jr., President of the Chicago Transit Authority and former APTA Chair and co-chair Richard A. Davey, President of New York City Transit, presented immediate actions to bolster competitiveness and stability in the U.S. bus manufacturing sector. The Task Force recommended, amongst other things, three immediate changes in bus contracts: price adjustments, progress payments, and the use of price indices. The full set of recommendations are available on the APTA website.