VinFast Eyes US Electric Bus Market With Full-Service Fleet Offering

Vietnamese automaker VinFast is setting its sights on American public transit, unveiling a plan that goes well beyond simply selling electric buses. The company intends to bundle the vehicles together with charging infrastructure, maintenance, and day-to-day operations into a single service package aimed at transit agencies and fleet operators.

The announcement came at the APTA TRANSform & EXPO in Chicago, where VinFast signed an initial agreement with NexMove, a joint venture formed by passenger transportation company Transportation Management Services and commercial charging provider Zeem Solutions. Under the arrangement, NexMove would offer a service contract carrying a 97% uptime guarantee — a figure that speaks directly to the reliability concerns that often keep fleet managers wary of electrification.

VinFast points to roughly 2,000 of its electric buses already running in Vietnam as evidence that the product is ready for prime time. Those vehicles use LFP batteries, support fast charging, and come equipped with camera- and radar-based driver alert systems. Notably, the company has not yet disclosed which models it would bring to the US, nor any details on range, pricing, or charging speeds.

To give prospective buyers a hands-on look, NexMove plans to station demonstration buses at Zeem charging depots, allowing transit agencies and fleet operators to inspect them before any regulatory approvals are in place. The partners also intend to establish US manufacturing capacity that satisfies Federal Transit Administration requirements, though no site or production timeline has been announced. Buses cleared for US service are expected to start reaching customers in the first quarter of 2028.

Paul Gioupis, founder and CEO of Zeem Solutions and a cofounder of NexMove, described a recent visit by his team to VinFast’s manufacturing operations, saying they came away impressed by how many buses were in daily service and by the scale and quality of production. He called it a proven product with real operating history and expressed hope that US manufacturing meeting FTA requirements would soon let public transit agencies put the buses to work.