Explore the full 2022 list of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies, 528 organizations whose efforts are reshaping their businesses, industries, and the broader culture. We’ve selected the firms making the biggest impact with their initiatives across 52 categories, including the most innovative logistics, enterprise, and consumer goods companies.
This year’s list of the most innovative transportation companies showcases efforts to improve safety, performance, and sustainability across a range of vehicle types—cars, trucks, planes, scooters, and even school buses. Autonomous driving remains a major focus, with makers of lidar systems, such as AEye, helping vehicles—with or without drivers—to quickly and accurately identify and steer clear of threats on the road. Cupertino-based Plus offers an assist for drivers of heavy trucks, helping out with highway driving. With more countries and auto makers signing on to meet ambitious zero-emission goals, innovation in batteries and charging technologies is accelerating—see FreeWire and Ample. China’s BYD not only built a better battery for EV cars, trucks, and buses, it has also become the world’s second-biggest maker of new energy vehicles, nipping at Tesla’s heels. Polestar, while ramping up production of its luxury EVs, is taking important steps to trace raw materials in its vehicle and carbon embedded in their manufacture. Airline JetBlue made major commitments to buying sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) for its flights out of Los Angeles and New York, with a goal of converting 10% of its total jet fuel use to SAF by 2030. Meeting growing demand for flexible mobility options, scooter maker Superpedestrian is deploying its e-scooters, with new safety features, in cities worldwide, including traditionally underserved parts of Los Angeles. HopSkipDrive offers a school bus alternative for nonroutine student transport, helping school districts address budgetary challenges and a serious driver shortage. As e-commerce continued to drive soaring demand for trucking services, Merchants Fleet launched programs to help put 15,000 new and refurbished vehicles on the road, helping customers deliver 3 million packages per day. The company plans to electrify 50% of its fleet by 2025, including 12,600 new EVs from GM-owned BrightDrop.
1. BYD
For building a battery that makes EVs affordable
The Warren Buffett-backed Chinese battery company, one of China’s largest private enterprises, has become a major player in electrifying the auto industry. Backed by innovations such as its DM-i plug-in hybrid system and lightweight, lower-cost lithium iron phosphate (LFP) Blade battery, BYD grew sales of its “new energy” (hybrid or all-electric) passenger vehicles by more than 231% year over year in 2021, selling nearly 600,000 new energy passenger cars. Tesla is the only other carmaker to sell more. Toyota tapped the company to partner on batteries and others tech for a new all-electric EV for China, still in development, with a reported price tag under $30,000. BYD is also one of the biggest makers of EV buses, trucks, and forklifts—it sold 70,000 electric buses worldwide last year, and its U.S. commercial vehicle plant employs about 750 unionized workers in Lancaster, California.
Recognize your brand’s excellence by applying to this year’s Brands That Matter Awards before the early-rate deadline, May 3.
