Ford Motor has agreed to invest US$500 million in Rivian, an electric-car startup that is widely seen as a potential rival to Tesla, Ford announced Wednesday.[NEW YORK] Ford Motor has agreed to invest US$500 million in Rivian, an electric-car startup that is widely seen as a potential rival to Tesla, Ford announced Wednesday.
On Thursday, Ford is scheduled to report its first-quarter earnings, and many analysts expect a decline. In 2018, its profits fell more than 50 per cent."We can learn a lot from Rivian, how quickly they turn around ideas," Ford's chairman, William C. Ford Jr, said in an interview."There's a great benefit from working with a clean-sheet approach" to electric vehicles.
Rivian, which was founded in 2009 by RJ Scaringe, an MIT-trained engineer, introduced its truck and SUV in public in November. It builds each model on a chassis, shaped like a skateboard, containing all the components that propel the vehicle — a large battery pack, axles, suspension, cooling system and four electric motors. With a full charge, Rivian's pickup will have a range of 400 miles, the company says.
Rivian has set a goal of selling about 20,000 vehicles in 2021 and twice that many in 2022. Tesla sold about 245,000 last year, although sales have slumped this year and Tesla reported a loss for the first quarter Wednesday. Ford had already planned to spend US$11 billion to develop nearly two dozen electric vehicles, including a small SUV due next year and a version of its F-150 pickup truck. The company plans to use Rivian's skateboard chassis to produce additional models.
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