Rivian partners with Samsung SDI in electric truck battery deal
American electric vehicle startup Rivian announced today that it had reached a successful deal with South Korea’s Samsung SDI Co Limited to supply battery cells for its R1T and R1S electric trucks.
The Rivian R1T
American electric vehicle startup Rivian announced today that it had reached a successful deal with South Korea’s Samsung SDI Co Limited to supply battery cells for its R1T and R1S electric trucks.
“We’re excited about the performance and reliability of Samsung SDI battery cells combined with our energy-dense module and pack design,” said RJ Scaringe, chief executive officer of Rivian.
Samsung SDI currently has battery supply deals with BMW and Volkswagen, estimated to each be valued around $3-4 billion US over 10 years. The value and terms of the Rivian deal is undisclosed, and it is unclear whether the deal also includes batteries for the company’s electric delivery vans.
Rivian is planning to start production of its R1T and R1S models by mid-2021, and is backed by some big players, including the Ford Motor Company and Amazon.com Inc. The automaker recently announced a successful funding round led by T. Rowe Price, raising $2.65 billion US.
It’s obviously going to be a big year for Rivian, but it could get bigger; the company is likely planning an Initial Public Offering (IPO) later in 2021. Bloomberg reported in February that Rivian is in talks with banks.
A number of EV startups have made the leap to publicly traded companies recently via reverse mergers with shell companies known as special purpose acquisition companies (SPAC). These include Xpeng, Nikola Motors, Lordstown and Canoo. It’s also expected by some analysts that Lucid Motors will go down this route.
Rivian’s skateboard platform. Image: Rivian
Rivian announces new funding windfall; company valued at $27.6 billion
Rivian has raised USD$2.65 billion as it readies itself for production of the all-electric R1T pickup truck this July.
Rivian closes January 2021 investment round with $2.65 billion
Rivian has raised USD$2.65 billion as it readies itself for production of the all-electric R1T pickup truck this July.
Spearheaded by funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates Inc, investors included Fidelity Management and Research Company, Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund, Coatue and D1 Capital Partners as well as “several other existing and new investors” according to Rivian.
Rivian has already raised close to $USD8 billion since early 2019, but as we all know, manufacturing a vehicle is not an inexpensive task. Rivian has spent almost $1 billion on the former Mitsubishi factory in Normal Illinois where it plans to commence manufacturing operations this year. The company plans to produce the R1T Pickup, R1S SUV as well as the Rivian/Amazon delivery van there.
Rivian CEO and founder RJ Scaringe said in a statement “The support and confidence of our investors enables us to remain focused on these launches while simultaneously scaling our business for our next stage of growth,”
According to Chicago Business, a person familiar with the workings of Rivian’s funding said that the company is presently worth around US$27.6 billion. Any suggestions that Rivian might be going public with an IPO sometime soon have been quashed by Scaringe, who stated in the video below that “the company is focused on the product and back-end operations for the next year”, indicating we’re unlikely to see an IPO in the shirt term.
Source: Rivian
