Rivian and VW have lately opened a partnership, regardless of the manufacturers have very related upcoming electrical journey autos with the Rivian R2 and VW Scout. However at a roundtable dialogue with Rivian’s CEO RJ Scaringe, he stated there’s greater than sufficient room for the manufacturers to coexist with one another.
Latest information about Rivian and VW’s software program partnership, with VW investing over $5 billion into Rivian and forming a three way partnership to undertake Rivian’s zonal structure for the underpinnings of VW’s automobile communications, has led to some fascinating questions on how the main points of the partnership would work out.
On the high of many individuals’s minds has been: isn’t it a little bit bizarre that the Rivian-like Scout model will now primarily be competing with itself for the journey EV market?
The query has been answered earlier than – or maybe extra particularly non-answered – in press conferences across the official opening of the three way partnership final week.
Usually, feedback ran alongside the road of Rivian working to deliver its software program experience to bear throughout VW’s manufacturers, although the 2 firms have been a little bit shy to substantiate whether or not Scout particularly would use Rivian’s software program. In spite of everything, Scout is a little bit of a derivative from VW, and appears considering exhibiting some independence on that entrance, so it may very well be doable that they work on their very own.
However in feedback at a roundtable which Electrek attended immediately forward of the LA Auto Present, it actually appeared that Rivian can be engaged on Scout autos. Scaringe stated that “we’re going to be supporting their full portfolio of manufacturers – Porsche, Audi, Volkswagen, Scout.”
Nevertheless, extra importantly, Scaringe stated that he’s “amused” by the main focus that many have had on Scout, or those that contemplate it a possible menace to Rivian.
Scaringe estimates that there are “lower than 5” compelling EVs accessible for underneath $50k out there immediately – and that’s maybe being charitable. In the meantime, in case you go over to the gasoline world, there are gobs of selections on the market for shoppers, and but all of them handle to coexist with out difficulty.
So Rivian has labored onerous to differentiate itself from Tesla, for instance, and thinks that even when Scout is impressed by Rivian, there’s nonetheless room for related autos to coexist.
In spite of everything, there are numerous competing autos in lots of classes – a few of which do certainly share underpinnings from separate firms. Simply within the EV house, the Kia EV6 and Hyundai Ioniq 5 share a platform, and the Subaru Solterra and Toyota bZ4X are principally an identical autos. So there was loads of historical past of firms working collectively to come back out with related or near-identical (rebadged) automobiles.
That’s not the case right here, as Scout and Rivian can be very completely different when it comes to platform and manufacturing. However sharing software program shouldn’t be a lot of a difficulty – and even if we assume that Scout may cannibalize a section of the market that Rivian in any other case had a superb maintain on, Rivian can nonetheless profit from the partnership regardlessl.
Rivian’s foremost focus in recent times has been getting prices down. The story is that Rivian started scaling manufacturing in a particularly tough time – attempting to arrange provide contracts on the historic peak of the auto business (~2018), attempting to begin a producing program throughout a worldwide pandemic (2020/2021), and having little clout accessible to get on the higher aspect of these contracts.
Now, Scaringe stated, the scenario is healthier: not solely can Rivian present that it has a dominant place in its class – promoting extra premium SUVs than different EV and even gasoline manufacturers – however it could possibly additionally tout that it has assist from some of the established auto producers on the planet, Volkswagen. If VW – the second-largest automaker on the planet – has sufficient religion in Rivian to speculate $5.8 billion, then certainly a provider can belief that Rivian will stick round lengthy sufficient to purchase a couple of set of components.
Not solely that, however the firms may doubtlessly leverage their mixed measurement for bigger provide contracts. Say a sure microcontroller is required for automobile structure throughout Rivian and in addition VW’s manufacturers, then maybe the three way partnership may acknowledge a lot bigger economies of scale.
The query additionally got here up over whether or not Rivian may attempt to see if VW’s international gross sales community may assist them to promote Rivians, however Scaringe shut that down, saying there may be “no curiosity” in doing so. Rivian would quite persist with its plans of establishing its personal shops and doing direct gross sales.
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