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Help end debate: Is it true Rivian was scheduled to begin delivery of R1T in July, without details on infotainment or charging?

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I'm a huge Rivian fan, at least as much of a fan as one can be...for a brand that has zero sales :)

I got to thinking about R1T July 2021 release date (now delayed, as per RJ update last week), and wanted to make sure I understand what buyers would have had for information.

So let's go back to July 1st, 2021. R1T buyers on July 1st...

  • Would have had zero details surrounding infotainment
  • Would have had zero details surrounding charging speeds or charging performance

Is that sound accurate?

I ask this because I am trying to re-evaluate how long I should expect to wait for a vehicle. Last I knew, we had zero details on charging performance or infotainment, and the release date was just weeks away. I find this incredibly far-fetched; the idea that in just weeks I could be receiving a vehicle, while none of this information was available. People have challenged me. They've asked me why am I pipe dreaming about Rivian deliveries?

Basically, if you are a vendor entering the EV space; what features would you be sure to advertise, demo, show off? Probably the infotainment and charging performance (among others), right? I think this is a fair assessment. I know we know about speaker choices (Meridian), we know about the foldout camping deal, but what do we really know....that involves software or electrical engineering?

I have been challenged by others, and their reasoning has been pretty hard to disagree with. They have challenged me and basically expressed that;

  • Rivian infotainment must be unreliable/slow/lacking in features/crashing. Basically not ready for production, and not something that Rivian is comfortable with sharing to the outside world - as it would give people (good or bad) impressions - and potentially even have an impact on fundraising abilities. Fair argument...
  • Rivian charging performance must be ....... And that is why they can't share more details. Fill in the blank with your own ideas. They have suggested slow, unreliable, and with the latest Bolt and Kona recalls - potentially trying to engineer around electrical fire risks. Basically we don't know, because the details don't exist.
  • It is significant that the launch wasn't delayed until just last week, mid-Month..in the same month that Rivian was hoping to start shipping. Put yourself in a Rivian potential-customers shoe. There were R1T customers who were just hours or days from being able to receive their vehicles, and these details were absent.

In their experience with product launches, the lack of details and timing suggests;

  • This isn't a chip shortage problem. Chip shortages don't stop you from demoing/showcasing your infotainment system or charging performance
  • Unstable or poorly performing products (or components within a product) is why details aren't shared
  • There are Hail Mary attempts to make this launch happen. A chip shortage wasn't new in July 2021. This was known months ago. This was a; if you can deliver XYZ (performance, features) by ABC date, we can ship in July. The fact the announcement didn't come until mid Month meant RJ was ready to ship in July, until RJ learned something last week. Someone delivered bad news about something (people I chat about my R1S purchase with think it has to be about charging performance and infotainment)
  • 2 assembly lines shared between 3, with one line dedicated to commercial vans is not going to allow R1S owners to receive a vehicle in 2021, and probably not in 2022 either....
  • The fact they are willing to only showcase....not-important features (as they describe it) that are very rudimentary (like camping stove) should tell us how anxious they are to show off anything. And also show us how....they just don't have the software/electrical stuff figured out

I am taking a moment to reset my expectations, so the Rivian experience isn't a let-down. They have me convinced that while the Rivian looks great from outside, the lack of details surrounding what's inside...and how it charges, should be concerning me more - considering we were just hours...from customers receiving vehicles.

They have me convinced; R1T will not make it to customers before 2022 and R1S before 2023. We have bets on if RJ makes it as CEO past 2021 and 2022. They feel RJ is not showing the commitment needed to deliver what is promised (this comes in the age one of the worlds richest CEO's (Musk) sleeping in his factories to make production goals). Basically...

We've been hearing about this little startup named Rivian for a decade now. We've been getting teased, while nothing of substance is making it to us. Rivian has now ate up more than 10bn in cash, and investors are going to be growing impatient with this 14yr old startup. RJ is in the hot seat, weather he shows it or not. And the fact this his Instagram shows him flying economy on Southwest gives us a glimpse of his own lack of comfort in his future (future finances, current finances).

We're really reading in between lines here, but I can't say that the criticism is unfair.
My spouse read the RJ note from last week and saw the comment about 7000 employees on staff, and she laughed saying; "what are they doing everyday? Just sitting around?"
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  • Would have had zero details surrounding charging speeds or charging performance

Is that sound accurate?
Charging performance has been specified as 140 miles in 20 minutes. Been known for a long time. EPA range is still TBD however.
 

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my belief, with the infotainment, is that they haven’t finalized what services they will add(Spotify etc.) seems like they would have to have these services make apps for their software. Maybe incurring a fee that they would rather put off until they start delivering to customers?
 

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There's literally very little difference between the information that's available now and what buyers if the model S plaid had prior to delivery day. Elon is a showman, you don't know what RJ is/isn't doing. There are fairly straightforward reasons for delays that aren't uncommon, as shown by the multitude of delays that Tesla had with the new model S, which they have currently stopped delivering. Are you questioning Tesla's ability to deliver vehicles? Elon is on Twitter all the time, does he not have the dedication to make sure the model refreshes are delivered?

Regarding infotainment, who cares? I don't recall seeing a walk through if the Ioniq5 infotainment prior to getting it into the hands of reviewers.
 
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Charging performance has been specified as 140 miles in 20 minutes. Been known for a long time. EPA range is still TBD however.
Key word, up to. Friends point out no one has actually seen anything. In theory, there was supposed to be a $35,000 Model 3, but we see how that went.

my belief, with the infotainment, is that they haven’t finalized what services they will add(Spotify etc.) seems like they would have to have these services make apps for their software. Maybe incurring a fee that they would rather put off until they start delivering to customers?
Food for thought: BMW did not have Android Auto support on their cars until recently. BMW did, however, have Apple CarPlay support. Support for the entire Android Auto system was rolled out to cars with Apple CarPlay with a software update. I use this to provide context on automakers abilities to really deliver more than minor infotainment features to existing vehicles. I personally do not believe the infotainment is not being demonstrated or shipped to customers because of a lack of integration with say Spotify, Pandora, Stitcher, etc. These are minor features, and frankly - if customers can use Android Auto / Apple CarPlay (can’t do that in a Tesla :p ), then the need to develop your own native-OS integrations with these 3rd parties can be unnecessary. The native-OS integrations could perform better, and if it were truly just these integrations lacking - I would still love to see what I am buying (they can show me where the Pandora icon would be, if they feel this would really impress me during the demo).

There's literally very little difference between the information that's available now and what buyers if the model S plaid had prior to delivery day. Elon is a showman, you don't know what RJ is/isn't doing. There are fairly straightforward reasons for delays that aren't uncommon, as shown by the multitude of delays that Tesla had with the new model S, which they have currently stopped delivering. Are you questioning Tesla's ability to deliver vehicles? Elon is on Twitter all the time, does he not have the dedication to make sure the model refreshes are delivered?

Regarding infotainment, who cares? I don't recall seeing a walk through if the Ioniq5 infotainment prior to getting it into the hands of reviewers.
I definitely care about infotainment. Especially with an EV - as I have to sit in the vehicle at DC fast chargers, and well.....drive the vehicle everyday. I definitely question Tesla’s ability to deliver vehicles, too. But when push came to shove with Model 3 production goals - we literally seen Elon Musk go sleep in a factory. If I were an investor with Rivian - I would be telling RJ to get his camping bag, because he is sleeping under that R1T with the pullout stove until vehicles start getting delivered.

Elon is a showman, which I don’t always like. I wasn’t a Model S buyer, but that is a great point about people putting a lot of faith in a company that essentially had only proven they can do a Rich Rebuilds conversion on a Lotus. I hope that comment makes you realize I am not a Tesla fanboy here to crap on Rivian.

I am a wannabe customer that is waiting on a 14 year old startup that has raised almost 11 billion dollars, and delivered nothing but delays. My friends rag on me all the time. 14 years...and we can’t even get a demo of the infotainment, or see how these things really charges. And how it really charges - I am talking about give it to YouTubers like Out of Spec (See Mach E EV charging performance for a great example of what the vendor says vs. what customers experience). In North America, outside of established automakers, Rivian and Lucid are the closest to market brands that we can look forward to seeing. It would be a lie to say that it isn’t testing my patience with these delays. I’ve been looking at 5 year old computer generated drawings enough, and I can’t disagree with the people who rag on me - I don’t have a lot to say other then...well lets hope....

RJ - give me something. Get on a social media platform and start live-streaming, tonight. Start showing me more than a collapsible cooking platform.
 
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Potential buyers are all adults who can readily understand what is known and unknown about a vehicle. Nobody was demanding money from random strangers in exchange for an unknown vehicle. Willing early adopters were willing to take the risk (with a convenient 7-day return period to provide some comfort if the thing ends up being a dog). They undoubtedly intend to have specs available at the time of sale, but we're not actually there yet, are we?
 

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You sound crazy tbh. Rivian is getting money from private investors, let them worry about getting a return.

The R1T will be posted about in all it's gory or glorious details well before 99% of us will have to pay for one. Unless you've been contact for an Aug deliver date why worry at this point.

The fact that they just got 2+billion after announcing a delay tells me they are close and probably have something pretty good.
 

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Oh yeah, there was and still is little info or finalized info on how the infotainment works, range, EPA ratings, and crash safety ratings, among other little things. We do know a lot but there's still a lot we don't know. Which is crazy. Which means, they didn't want to share it, it wasn't ready to share because it wasn't finalized or it wasn't meeting the targets or expectations they had set and advertised. Or maybe some combination of the three.

On top of that, the previous plan of them delivering in July made no sense because in the same post they said test drives would start in August. This post, https://stories.rivian.com/deliveries-drivetour-accessories, used to say deliveries were to start July and the drive program was to start in August. It now has been updated to say deliveries start in September and the drive program still says August. That leads me to believe the deliveries were never going to happen in July. And whoever initially posted this didn't realize the discrepancy in the timing.

Would most people purchase a vehicle they hadn't even seen or driven? Let alone have final info on EPA range, safety ratings, infotainment.
 

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It now has been updated to say deliveries start in September and the drive program still says August. That leads me to believe the deliveries were never going to happen in July. And whoever initially posted this didn't realize the discrepancy in the timing.

Would most people purchase a vehicle they hadn't even seen or driven? Let alone have final info on EPA range, safety ratings, infotainment.
RJ's email said drive program is expected to start in September.

Plenty of people make that decision. For example, literally all of the initial S plaid purchasers. They didn't even know how they would put their car into drive as far as I can remember. ?

Literally none of your assumptions preclude deliveries from happening. You're just focused on this one delivery, so you're hyper aware about the information *you* want before you receive the vehicle, but don't have (I don't blame you).
 

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RJ's email said drive program is expected to start in September.

Plenty of people make that decision. For example, literally all of the initial S plaid purchasers. They didn't even know how they would put their car into drive as far as I can remember. ?

Literally none of your assumptions preclude deliveries from happening. You're just focused on this one delivery, so you're hyper aware about the information *you* want before you receive the vehicle, but don't have (I don't blame you).
You're right, his letter does say the drive program starts in September. Dang, they can't even get the letter from the CEO sync'd with their website. Microcosm of the communication issues at Rivian.
 

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I would agree on this timing. Not sure about the catching fire part, they have so many pre production models out I think we would have seen that happen by now…?
 

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Why compare it with the Model S Plaid?

Plaid is a trim level to an existing 8+ year-old model. A single trim. A trim level shouldn’t be compared with an entire new car. ?

It’s been true for months: Rivian doesn’t have enough confidence that more information will gain new sales / pre-orders, which is a shame, but very normal for secretive development.

This is the typical hype cycle: there’s not much left in the tank to excite versus disappoint. Safety ratings, some infotainment like third-party charging compatibility, etc. are still likely universally positive, but not much else.

Unfortunately, I imagine most information remaining are compromises for some, dealbreakers for others, and concerns for the rest.

I remember Tesla forums during the X launch. Almost everything hidden post-launch was not Tesla’s best foot. Some was OK, but clearly some of it also was changing at the last minute.

Rivian is quite aware of early press = setting expectations / narrative for the next six months before competitors arrive.

I imagine they’ve long planned for a “big reveal” on the 1st delivery day and they won’t budge now.

In good ways and bad, it’s extremely similar to a Kickstarter. Trickle information, have a few delays, find a few gems, hide the compromises, and try to get it out the door as quickly as possible. A lot of products have used this method, good and bad. IIRC, Tesla didn’t even have the radios working on the Model 3 launch.

Looks like it’s been rushed for Rivian, too, judging from their status updates. Tough to launch a new car + company during a global pandemic, both for the management and the employees.

//

In the end, it’s all right for the hype to end. What’s more important is how Rivian handles its crises, its mistakes, its disliked choices. That is what’ll decide how ownership goes and the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Rivian purchase.
 

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I would agree on this timing. Not sure about the catching fire part, they have so many pre production models out I think we would have seen that happen by now…?
No pre-production Bolts, Konas or Model S Plaids went up in flames, did they?
 

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I would agree on this timing. Not sure about the catching fire part, they have so many pre production models out I think we would have seen that happen by now…?
Pre-production, though, is still a very small number.

Not to claim that there is any evidence R1S/R1T are fire-prone, but most defects are only visible in the 10k / 100k / millions units sold. Not malicious (for the most part): just that there are so many parts + so many different driving scenarios = something will fall out of spec somewhere for someone at some point.

The same with ICE cars. What is unfortunate, and maybe what that OP meant, is that the initial batches do have the least insight & input on these long-term defects. But that's what a warranty + safety regulations are for, so I take it in like a normal car buying experience. A select few might go kaput, but the vast majority shouldn't.

No car is immune to these defects, so I'm more interested how Rivian responds, how quickly cars can get serviced, what the loaner situation is like, how long the fixes last, how Rivian fixes the root causes, etc.
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