Rivian Automotive

Rivian Automotive is an automotive company developing electric vehicle technology, including the design, development, and manufacturing of electric vehicles and accessories. The company was founded in 2009 by Robert Scaringe and is headquartered in June 2009. Vehicles made by Rivian Automotive have quad motors, independent air suspension, an intelligent battery management system, a hydraulic roll control system, and a thermal system. The company is focused on developing initiatives in vehicle manufacturing to increase sustainability. The vehicles developed by Rivian were initially focused on off-road capable vehicles.

Rivian has several facility locations, including Irvine, California, and a factory in Normal, IL, purchased for $2 million that had previously been used by Mitsubishi Motors. Rivian manufactures most of the components of its electric vehicles at the Normal, Illinois factory.

A tour of the Normal, IL plant

Founded in 2009 as Mainstream Motors by CEO RJ Scaringe, Rivian Automotive would be renamed to Avera Automotive briefly before Scaringe eventually settled on the name Rivian Automotive, with the name coming from the Indian River near where Scaringe grew up in Florida. The company has focused on developing and manufacturing electric vehicles since its founding, and it has also been working to develop autonomous driving capabilities. In 2011, Rivian unveiled its first vehicle concept, a sporty coupe prototype, which would eventually be scrapped, despite some reported excitement for the prototype to come to market.

By 2015, Rivian had pivoted its focus to SUVs and trucks, vehicles other electric vehicle companies at the time seemed less interested in, while CEO RJ Scaringe wanted a vehicle that fit his outdoor lifestyle. It also received enough funding to operate research facilities in California and Michigan. In 2017, the funding increased to allow the company to purchase the former Mitsubishi facility in Normal, Illinois, which has become the company's North American manufacturing hub.

It would be again in 2017 that Rivian announced its first two prototypes were complete, which would later be debuted at the LA Auto Show and with production scheduled to begin in 2020. CEO RJ Scaringe referred to the company's earlier coupe concept and has said the company changed its strategy following that car to keep concepts to themselves until they were completely realized and until Rivian was sure it could deliver on the promise of the concept. In the case of the R1T and R1S, outside of some cancellations of lower-powered models, Rivian has sent customers the near-identical vehicle to what was shown off in the 2018 LA Auto Show.

Rivian sent its first all-electric pickup truck, the R1T, to customers in September of 2021. This was important to Rivian, as the company wanted to be the first to deliver an electric truck to market. It beat out the Ford F-150 Lightning, the GMC Hummer EV, and the Tesla Cybertruck in getting to market. It was important not only to have a product on the market but also for Rivian to be shown to be able to bring its vehicles to market, despite the company facing manufacturing difficulties, including hours lost to shutdowns and weather and battery supply issues, which have challenged their ability to manufacture the vehicles on time. Following the release of the R1T, Rivian has focused on delivering its R1S SUV and Amazon delivery vans.

Rivian manufactures the company's R1T pickup truck, R1S SUV, and delivery van largely at its Normal, Illinois factory. Both the R1T and R1S are developed to ride comfortably and capably on-road and be capable of traversing off-road terrain. Both vehicles were initially developed with an EPA-rated 314 miles, developed on the same drivetrain and chassis. Rivian promised both longer and shorter range versions, to expand the vehicle capabilities and price brackets, and also include common creature comforts, such as large touchscreen-enabled infotainment systems, driver assistance software, and multiple terrain driving capabilities. Rivian unveiled its all-electric R1T pickup and R1S SUV at the Los Angeles Auto Show in November 2018.

Image of the Rivian R1T truck.

The R1T is a truck that features a driving range of up to 400+ miles; the ability to accelerate from 0-60 in 3 seconds; up to 750 horsepower; a combined motor torque of 829 ft-lb; and a 105, 135, or 180 kWh battery. The R1T chassis is built upon Rivian's skateboard chassis and contains the batteries under the passenger compartment to keep the center of gravity down. The truck is developed to tow an 11,000-pound trailer, although this will depend on the powertrain chosen. Ground clearance for the R1T is 14.5 inches, and pricing is expected to start at USD $70,000 depending on the trim package purchased. Initially, the truck was expected to come in three trim packages—Launch Edition, Adventure, and Explore—but it later scrapped the Explore package to focus on fulfilling the Adventure package. The Launch edition was only available for the initial trucks rolled off the line.

The R1T runs on independent air suspension intended to allow users to raise and lower the ride height as much as six inches and has active damping to adjust shock stiffness depending on the ride mode and driving style, while hydraulic roll control is intended to reduce "head-toss" when off-roading. The R1T also comes with what Rivian calls a "gear tunnel," a crawl space that can hold an optional slide-out camp kitchen, can be used for storage, and can function as seats capable of holding up to 250 pounds each.

The R1T is developed to be easy to recharge, without needing a proprietary charger to do so, and supporting charge rates up to 30 kWh. Some reports have suggested the R1T is able to charge from 10 to 90 percent in 70 minutes on a fast charger, and using a Level 2 charger can charge the vehicle from 0 to 100 percent overnight.

The R1S features an SUV with a range of up to 400+ miles; the ability to accelerate from 0-60 in 3 seconds; up to 750 horsepower; a combined motor torque of 829 ft-lb; and a 105, 135, or 180 kWh battery. The R1S sits upon the same proprietary skateboard platform developed by Rivian but increases the room for seating and cargo when compared to the R1T. This includes a seven-seat option. The R1S has two trim packages as well, the same as the R1T: the Launch Edition and the Adventure Package.

The R1S has similar range and recharge characteristics as the R1T and is developed to offer users luxury, range, and capable of off-road driving in rugged terrains. The R1S has an electro-hydraulic anti-roll system to encourage flat handling, up to 15 inches of rock-conquering ground clearance, and adjustable air suspension.

Rivian has also developed, in partnership with Amazon, an electric delivery van meant for fleet operations. The commercial van is developed for safety, performance, and longevity; interiors designed to emphasize driver comfort and ergonomics; technology to increase driver safety; configurable models for 500 to 700 cubic feet of cargo capacity; and potential for integrated factory upfitting. Safety features include a strengthened door on the driver's side for additional protection, traffic assist technology, and a large windshield to increase driver visibility. The bulkhead doors are powered to open automatically when a driver reaches a destination and were developed with lightweight and low-cost batteries to increase the lifetime of the vehicle.

The vans were delivered as part of Amazon's fleet in 2022, with the vans being used in Baltimore, Chicago, Dallas, Kansas City, Nashville, Phoenix, San Diego, Seattle, and St. Louis, and intended to continue to expand to new cities. And as part of Amazon's fleet, Amazon has added charging stations at its delivery stations across the United States.

In its commercial vehicles, Rivian ships its FleetOS, a proprietary management platform, intended to optimize and automate fleet operations and to improve the total cost of ownership and maximize uptime. The FleetOS offers comprehensive trip oversight, remote diagnostics, and collision reports intended to maintain the fleet uptime and improve driver safety. The FleetOS offers cloud-based tools that can be accessed on multiple devices and can be integrated with non-Rivian products to help users manage mixed-vehicle fleets.

Underlying Rivian's vehicles—the R1T, R1S, and commercial vans—is a shared "skateboard" chassis (so named because of its resemblance to a skateboard). The chassis is composed of two dual-motor units mounted on each axle, with each motor capable of independently providing power to each tire. The front axle has a compact 415 hp unit capable of providing 413 lb feet of torque, while the rear has a higher powered 420 hp unit capable of providing 495 lb feet of torque. These units work together with torque vectoring to neutralize oversteer and understeer and provide stability and responsiveness in on-road and off-road scenarios.

Rivian's "skateboard" chassis.

The lowest part of Rivian's skateboard chassis is the battery packs, which provide structural support to the vehicle and are engineered to withstand extreme conditions and temperature ranges. Similarly, the chassis includes the independent air suspension system included in its vehicles, active damping in the suspension system, and conventional anti-roll bars are replaced by electro-hydraulic roll control systems to increase responsiveness and traction.

In 2019, Rivian announced plans to sell the skateboard chassis independently of its vehicles, with Ford Motor Company lining up as the first company for inclusion in a planned Lincoln electric SUV. However, in 2020, Ford announced a change in its plans, which included building its own Lincoln EV chassis using Ford's own new electric vehicle platform.

Rivian is also developing a driver assistance program, called Driver+. The system can be introduced through over-the-air software updates. It offers driving assistance, including highway assist to automatically steer, brake, and accelerate on highways; adaptive cruise control to maintain a chosen speed and keep an appropriate distance from a vehicle ahead; lane change assist to help users change lanes on highways. Similarly, it offers lane safety features, such as lane keep assist, which helps users to steer the car in the lane and stop lane drifting; lane departure warning, to notify users if they steer their car towards the lane markers without a turn signal on; blind spot warning, to detect vehicles in blind spots.

Some of the features of the Driver+ assist program include light safety, in which the automatic high beams switch from low to high beams depending on vehicles detected nearby; rear cross-traffic warning, to alert users to traffic and people approaching when backing up from a parking spot; park assists, which include a 360-degree detection to help users park; trailer assist, to help users maneuver with a trailer attached; and collision warning systems to warn users of a potential collision, emergency brake to prevent a collisions, and brake support to help users brake.

The Driver+ driver assistance software is included in the R1T and R1S and is updated over the air. However, it is not a fully autonomous driving system, with CEO RJ Scaringe noting that Rivian is focused on developing driver assistance software systems capable of being used on hardware-constrained systems rather than developing autonomous driving systems using a hardware-heavy system. However, the aim is to develop the Driver+ system into an autonomous driving system capable of being run on hardware-constrained systems, allowing the system to be used on a greater range of vehicles.