Voltrac will manufacture 96 Thor autonomous electric tractors per year at a 1,200-square-metre factory in Valencia, the Spanish agtech startup has confirmed as the vehicle enters pre-series production.

The current Thor 2 — a pre-serial unit demonstrated at a robotics event in Berlin — is being followed by Thor 3, the first production-ready version. Longer-term blueprints target 1,000 vehicles per year.

The Thor is not a diesel tractor with a battery dropped in. Voltrac designed it from the ground up with autonomy as the starting point, and that decision ripples through every component on the machine.

What changed from a conventional tractor?

A typical tractor carries a gearbox, oil filters, radiators and a long list of parts prone to leaks. Voltrac removed all of them. The result: about 70% fewer components than a traditional tractor.

"By just removing them and electrifying, all we have is cables, instead of complex mechanisms," co-founder Francisco Infante Aguirre said.

In place of a drivetrain, the Thor runs one electric motor per wheel — four in total — each paired with a reduction box. The configuration delivers 20,000 Newton metres of wheel torque. Four-wheel propulsion also gives tight turning circles, important for orchards and vineyards where headland space is at a premium.

How does it keep running when something fails?

If one motor fails, the other three carry the machine on. "It's a tool. It's a workhorse. It has to carry on pushing," Infante Aguirre said. Each motor unit is accessible with two bolts, and Voltrac ships replacements directly to the farm.

That principle extends to energy. The Thor runs on hot-swappable battery packs delivering up to 20 hours of operation. Operators can carry a second set and swap them in minutes rather than charging in the field. Voltrac is also partnering with solar panel manufacturers to offer an off-grid charging package.

Hydraulics remain for now, to keep the standard three-point hitch compatible with any implement a farmer already owns. "For farmers, they don't have to buy anything fancy or new," Infante Aguirre noted. The company plans to phase hydraulics out as implement makers move to electric drives — closing the loop on fluid leaks on the field.

What does one operator actually supervise?

The operational model is one person running multiple vehicles across multiple fields — not one operator per machine. GPS precision sits at around 5 centimetres.

Connectivity runs through dual SIM cards and a Starlink link, with a remote teleoperator on standby. On board, a dual compute module splits work between functional safety and a CPU-GPU combination for machine learning. Stereo cameras cover front and rear; mono cameras watch the sides.

Every pass becomes a data layer. Operators can monitor crop health, flag disease early and adjust fertiliser and chemical inputs. Voltrac is also opening the compute platform to third-party developers, aiming to build a marketplace for field-level tools.

What comes next?

Voltrac is moving from demonstration to delivery. Thor 3 and serial production are the immediate targets from the Valencia site, where Infante Aguirre is unequivocal about the logic: "The talent is here, the precision manufacturing is here. The know-how is here."

Watch for first customer deliveries once Thor 3 enters production, and for the solar-charging bundle to roll out alongside the off-grid energy partnership.