Nicolas Brunet : Yes, certainly Ben. Ben, I’ll take this one. Look, there are a number of moving parts in the order books during the quarter, as you mentioned, the most important one was the removal of 140 Lion8 units related to the postponement. But there’s also some volatility caused by the timing of the subsidy programs and that’s expected as customers await to know what their allocations are or what the programs that are being put in place are renewed before they’re placing the order. I think it’s important to re-emphasize that we continue to see strong engagement from the customers towards fleet electrification. And we see some upcoming catalysts in the order flow. I mentioned earlier the EPA rounds two and three for which allocations to customers are expected, allocations of awards are expected early next year.
That’s $900 million of school bus funding right that’s coming in the US federally, somewhere in between end of Q1 and beginning of April. In the Quebec market here, which is obviously a big market for us, there was a positive in the subsidy program as it was being extended and renewed. And the good news is that the subsidy that previously paid $125,000 per school bus was extended, and it was increased where now the operators can obtain up to $175,000 per bus based on, depending on battery capacity. There’s the ZETF program that we talked about that could lead to, of course, near-term deliveries for us when we hopefully get the approval. But also that will drive more purchase order flows, we believe. And then there’s a number of various funding alternatives as well at the state and at the provincial level.
So overall, we continue to feel very good about the demand environment, but those subsidy programs can create some volatility in the order book on a quarter-to-quarter basis.
Benoît Poirier: Okay. And with respect to the subsidy bus order from Ireland, which is conditional, what is the timing with regard to the final approval for the King and ZETF subsidy?
Nicolas Brunet : Yes, I mean, we have a number of orders that are in the queue for the ZETF. Tough to point to specific timing of each, but we say on the larger orders, we’re progressing well in the dialogue. We hope that it’s in the near-term, but obviously difficult to pinpoint the specific time. But it’s live right now in the dialogue, very live.
Operator: We now have Dan Levy of Barclays.
Unidentified Analyst: Hi, Josh on for Dan’s line today. I had a quick question on if we’re getting any mixed benefits from an increase in U.S. sales. I saw that the U.S. volumes picked up quite a bit this quarter and ASPs also went up accordingly. I was wondering if there’s any correlation or special benefit from increasing sales into the U.S. versus Canada?
Nicolas Brunet : Yes, I’ll take this one. The short answer is yes, typically in the U.S. market we tend to sell units with more onboard energy, higher battery capacity, more options. The U.S. market is a more intricate market rather than the Canadian market where there’s less differences in between a province in the states. Obviously, the regulatory environment is different, and so we do tend to sell vehicles with more options that are more custom in the U.S. and have a higher average selling price. Obviously, keep in mind the U.S. market is about 10 times the Canadian market. It’s our goal to match that as an opportunity.
Unidentified Analyst: Thank you. And as a follow-up, we’re seeing somewhat slower EV uptake among the medium and heavy-duty trucks. And I was wondering if you have any inclinations on whether maybe like some of the states like California or any of those other states on the advanced clean fleet will potentially consider bumping up the potential regulatory credits to spare some more demand there.
