Wright group secures £7.4m orders

A Ballymena bus builder has secured contracts worth £7.4m for its new bus design.

Wright Group will supply the Mistral Group (UK) with 60 of its StreetLite buses, in a contract worth £6m.

It has also won an order worth £1.4m to deliver 12 to Isle of Man Transport. Wright Group invested over £2m in the development of the StreetLite bus.

It services both urban and rural routes and offers more seats than any other vehicle in its class.

Invest NI provided £616,520 to the company to support the development of the bus.

Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster said: "As one of Northern Ireland's most innovative manufacturing firms, the Wright Group recognises the value to be gained by continued investment in product development.

"This ethos has been of particular importance over the past 12-18 months as the downturn impacted on global sales.

"Clearly, the Wright Group's investments in innovation are now bearing fruit and will continue to support the future growth of the company."

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The Wright Streetshite or Lamp Post as it will be known will have no end of teething troubles, just like all new vehicles. I notice there are no big group orders yet, as the Goslo has the market well & truly sewn up

I expect Stagecoach to be buying some more AD soon

I don't really get all this "innovation" it is a bus, not a space shuttle. What are they innovating?

Stagecoach wont buy the Wright, and will stick with the Solo. The range is competing with the ADL Dart,and as Souter part owns ADL, along with his sister Ann Gloag, he will avoid Wright as much as possible. Ops who run Solos already will stick with what they know, because it will mean stocking a completely different set of spares, as it shares nothing with the Solo.

It has come 12 years too late. The Solo has been around since 1998, and has the market sewn up.

LynxZF7 wrote:I don't really get all this "innovation" it is a bus, not a space shuttle. What are they innovating?

Copying a 12 year old bus, and copying the ADL Dart? The longer versions are almost a clone of the ADL Enviro 200 in mechanical spec. Same engine & gearbox, and probably rear axle too!

Even then Stagecoach only brought 12 solos last year.

The Minstral website there's a comparing with the Streetshite and the Solo/Versa
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Mistral are doing a deal with Wright after the 5 year contract to rent/lease Optares expired. Optare have taken all leasing/rental in house now, so they can make the dealer's cut too..Who can blame them in this tough financial time?

Spotted sup lies there too, Solos have a 225 litre tank, and the radiator on the latest models is on the offside too..Whoops!