MARCH 20 20 FORBES.COM
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EConsequently, Amazon ordered 100,000 vans
from Rivian. At least 10,000 should be on the
road by late 2022, and all are expected to be op-
erating in Amazon’s fleet by 2024. The vans will
presumably become part of an end-to-end logis-
tics network that Amazon has been working on
since 2015. If so, expect more Rivian orders to
come down the road.
But it’s the Cox partnership that could prove
the most troubling for Musk. While Tesla has
more than 100 service centers in 30 states,
Cox handled more than 55 million service ap-
pointments in 2019 at its sprawling network
of commercial and dealer partner service cen-
ters across the United States. If something goes
wrong with an R1T or R1S, the idea, presum-
ably, is that a customer will be able to take the
vehicle to a Cox service center like Pivet to have
it repaired correctly and in a timely fashion,
something that Tesla has struggled with since
its inception.
Cox is also playing the long game with Rivi-
an—as more vehicles come to market, it wants
to control secondary sales. “My hope is with
the skills that we have,” says Cox president San-
dy Schwartz, “and with all the things that we’re
learning, that we’ll be the chief wholesale remar-
keter for all Rivians someday.”
Now they just have to build some.
T
he name of the Illinois town
that Rivian calls home is the per-
fect adjective to describe Scar-
inge himself and differenti-
ate him from Musk: Normal.Whereas Tesla’s cofounder is all bravado and
showmanship—he has weaponized his Twitter
account and turned it into a de facto marketing
division—Scaringe is soft-spoken and low-key.
While Musk is photographed with models and
pop stars, Scaringe is a family man, even if he
rarely sees his family lately. These days, he lives
out of a suitcase, spending five days a week trav-
eling among the company’s four offices to make
sure things are on schedule. His wife, Meagan,
and their three boys (all under 5) see him from
Friday night to Sunday evening in their unas-
suming three-bedroom house near Irvine. On
Sunday evening, he boards a plane to Michigan
and repeats the process to ensure that his larg-
er vision is being realized: thinking globally and
acting locally.
When the Mitsubishi plant closed in July 2015,
for example, the mood in Normal was decided-
ly funereal. “It hurt,” says Mayor Chris Koos. “It
left over 1,000 people out of work, which causes a
ripple effect throughout the community.”
Even after the plant was sold to Rivian for
$16 million in 2017, residents remained skepti-
cal. That negative sentiment soon changed, how-
ever. “Rivian showed interest in the lifestyle of
the community, the quality of education, afford-
able housing and access to transportation,” May-
or Koos says. The company even had a preview
day in Normal last summer to answer any ques-
tions from local residents. It made a big impact
on Normal’s perception of Rivian and, not sur-
prisingly, proved valuable when it came to re-
cruiting employees.
With the town onboard, Scaringe is now on a
mission to lead Rivian through its first produc-
tion cycle and expand its line. Though it’s too ear-
ly to tell who will win the EV wars, Rivian is one
of just a couple of companies that has a strong
chance not only to survive, but thrive, according
to Navigant’s Sam Abuelsamid. He thinks Rivi-
an might even be in a better position going for-
ward than Tesla: “If you’re talking about who’s
going to have potentially the most volume, get-
ting more vehicles to market in the near to mid-
term, [I’d say] probably Tesla.” But from an ac-
tual business standpoint, Rivian is “in the better
position to succeed because of the nature of the
products they have.”
But first, the rubber has to hit the road.The New Normal
Rivian’s complex
in Illinois was
formerly a Mitsubishi
factory, many of
whose workers
have returned.
Next, Scaringe will
purchase a 350-acre
farm nearby to
supply food for the
facility.