Recently, a report submitted by Tucson Future to the US Securities and Exchange Commission showed that the company will lay off 150 employees in the US, which is about 75% of the total number of US employees and 19% of the total number of global employees. This is Tucson's future personnel reduction, following the layoffs in December last year and May this year.
Tucson expects that this restructuring plan will generate approximately $7 million to $8 million in expenses, most of which will be used to pay severance pay, employee benefits, and related expenses. The restructuring costs will be recorded in the fourth quarter of 2023.
According to The Wall Street Journal, after this layoff, Tucson will have only 30 employees in the United States and will be responsible for the closure of Tucson's future US business, gradually selling the company's assets in the US, and assisting the company in transferring to the Asia Pacific region. Therefore, this layoff means that Tucson may completely withdraw from the US market in the future.
Tucson Future is an autonomous truck company co founded by Hou Xiaodi and Chen Mo in 2015. Prior to this, Tucson has conducted multiple autonomous driving tests in the United States and achieved commercial operations. When Tucson Future was listed on NASDAQ as the world's first autonomous driving stock in 2021, the outside world was optimistic about its future development.
However, in the following year, Tucson experienced management upheavals, the departure of co founders, and lost an important partnership with truck manufacturer Navistar. Last December, Tucson Future announced a restructuring and layoffs of approximately 25% in order to focus on investing in the research and development of autonomous truck technology.
At that time, Tucson continued to focus its strategic focus on the United States and planned to sell its Asian related business. But just six months later, Tucson's future shifted its strategic direction and began to shift its focus from North America to the Asia Pacific region.
In May of this year, due to failure to submit financial report data on time and being warned of suspension and delisting, Tucson restructured its US business in the future, laid off 30% of its workforce, and publicly stated for the first time that the company's focus will shift towards the Asia Pacific region. In June, Tucson Future announced that it was exploring strategic alternatives for its US business. If the US business is sold, Tucson's future focus will be on operating in the Asia Pacific region and other major global markets.
The main markets for Tucson's future efforts are Japan and China. In the past year, Tucson's future Asia Pacific subsidiary has continued to make progress in cooperation with several OEM manufacturers on L4 and L2+level commercial projects.
In June of this year, Tucson Future officially announced its entry into the Japanese market and began conducting autonomous driving tests on the Toei Expressway in Japan. In fact, in 2021, the Tucson Future Japan team has completed the system adaptation and testing verification of autonomous driving software with domestically produced Japanese trucks.
The actions of the Chinese market are also taking place simultaneously. In April this year, Tucson Future announced that its self-developed TDC TuSimple Domain Controller is expected to enter commercial production by the end of 2023, targeting the passenger car market. In terms of autonomous trucks, in June this year, Tucson Future obtained the first batch of unmanned intelligent connected vehicle road test licenses in Pudong New Area, Shanghai, and completed the first fully unmanned test of autonomous heavy-duty trucks on public roads.