NORMAL, Illinois - Electric-vehicle maker Rivian's drive to cut costs and turn its first profit has removed over 100 steps from the battery-making process, 52 pieces of equipment from the body shop and over 500 parts from the design of its flagship SUVs and pickups.
"We did a similar process of really going through and redesigning a number of components for cost, so we took over 35% of the material cost out of the vans," Scaringe said, referring to a January shutdown of the van line. The vehicles also come with a new architecture meant to reduce weight and improve manufacturing efficiency, including shedding 1.6 miles of wiring from each vehicle.
Cash and short-term investments fell by about $1.5 billion in the first quarter to just under $8 billion. Rivian had said it has enough capital to launch the less expensive and smaller R2 SUVs in early 2026.