Rivian, the startup company hoping to make a splash in the electric pickup market, gave prospective buyers some great news this week. It turns out that their debut models might be significantly cheaper than most of us originally expected.
The brand was showing off their truck and SUV models at an event in San Francisco recently. According to Reuters, Rivian CEO R.J. Scaringe mentioned that a mid-range pickup should start at about $69,000 USD. The SUV model, with similar mid-range specs, would be slightly more, beginning at $72,000.
That’s a bit better than their previous claims. Months ago, Rivian announced similar prices as above, but only for the bare-bones base models. If those prices have been upgraded to mid-level trims, it’s possible that the starting price for both the truck and the SUV may be about $7,000 cheaper. The R1T pickup has an advertised range of about 300 miles (480 km).
If Rivian can deliver on these price points (and the vehicle performance), they would immediately be a strong competitor in the electric vehicle sector. Companies like Tesla could see them eat into business. Traditional automakers like Ford and GM could also see their electric offerings struggle out of the gate if Rivian produces a strong product.
Right now, customers can reserve a Rivian vehicle by paying a $1,000 deposit. However, the company wouldn’t say exactly how many pre-orders they have received.
“So we’re excited by that. But we now have the challenge of a lot of pre-order customers aren’t going to get the cars as fast as they like because there’s such a long queue,” Scaringe said.
The first R1T pickup should hit the streets by the end of 2020. Meanwhile, the R1S SUV isn’t scheduled to be released until early 2021. The company was founded in 2009 and raised $3.6 million in funding. While the future of vehicles is certainly electric, we’ll have to wait and see if things go smoothly for Rivian. Tesla had plenty of bumps along their way to being worth $100 billion, after all.
Source: Rivian.com
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