Rivian E-Bike is Coming. RJ Tells Staff Electric Bike in Development

[DuoRivians]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...staff-ev-maker-is-developing-an-electric-bike

Rivian Automotive Inc. is developing an electric bike, the chief executive officer told staff, potentially expanding the EV maker’s product lineup.

RJ Scaringe disclosed the e-bike effort Friday at a companywide meeting, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified discussing private information. A small group of engineers is actively working on it, he said.

Rivian representatives declined to comment.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Scaringe was referring to a battery-electric motorcycle or bicycle. The company has patents for electric bicycle components and designs. The CEO hinted at the possibility of an e-bike at a conference in October, saying that the company had long-term ambitions to move into micromobility, but he hadn’t disclosed work on an actual product before Friday’s staff meeting.

The potential lineup expansion comes despite a broad push to cut costs across the company. Rivian earlier this week told workers it would be cut headcount by 6%, the second significant workforce reduction in the last 12 months.

Scaringe told staff at the meeting that the cuts were made to refocus on ramping production of its electric vehicles and, longer-term, profitability, according to the people. He said the company had tried to do too much at one time, they said.

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[JPC]

Total waste of time if this is bicycles. This market is completely saturated. Presumably -- to fit the Rivian ethos -- they'll try the MTB space. But all of the high end MTB makers are already making fantastic eMTBs, and people who buy those would view a Rivian bike as a gimmick.

 

[Dark-Fx]

Hoping for an electric adventure motorcycle. My Livewire is fun but I'd love something that we could take on ORV trails. Not super impressed with Zero's offerings.

 

[PappaBolt]

*yawn* Do they really need another R&D distraction? Let’s focus on scaling manufacturing and profitability.

 

[rraj2k81]

Jeez ! Seriously RJ needs to just focus on getting his production ramped up for the two existing products and putting that in the hand of his customers.

For all the Tesla and Elon hate, Tesla is successful today because they focused on the manufacturing and ramp up of a single line of products and making those lines a success before jumping into the next line.

Model S/X in the beginning and then Model 3/Y and now the CT/Semi.

 

[COdogman]

He said the company had tried to do too much at one time, they said.

He admits that but also announces another thing they are trying to do?

 

[Dark-Fx]

He admits that but also announces another thing they are trying to do?

They were already trying to do this. Maybe they hit some kind of an internal milestone, or maybe this is just an article about old news.

 

[COdogman]

They were already trying to do this. Maybe they hit some kind of an internal milestone, or maybe this is just an article about old news.

Yeah, it could be either I guess. I remember hearing about plans for a bike months ago, which makes his comments even more odd to me. If he made them back then is the bike still happening? If he made the comments now did he not learn his lesson?

 

[odingrey]

Regular ebike, I dunno if that's a good idea. There are a ton of them available by bike companies that will make a decent bike.

Now an electric motorcycle, or sur-ron competitor... That is interesting.

I have a sur-ron and r1t, and those two things seem to be perfectly made for each other.

 

[MXA121]

Yeah I would bet this is a Surron or Stark Varg type motorcycle. No reason to compete in E-MTB market which as noted above is saturated. The electric dirtbike/moto market, however, is expanding rapidly.

 

[R1Tom]

Hoping for an electric adventure motorcycle. My Livewire is fun but I'd love something that we could take on ORV trails. Not super impressed with Zero's offerings.

Livewire sold like 95 bikes in Q4. Cannot imagine that cash burn...I never understood why they limit offering to like 3 colors. HD orange is so cool...but gone from Livewire offering...

 

[TXR1S]

Completely stupid waste of time. Focus RJ!

 

[Rivian_Hugh_III]

It’ll have 250hp, 300 lbft of torque, 3 powered wheels, and will be available in 4 years, no 5 years, no 6 years…

 

[quartz]

A class-3 e-bike (28mph with throttle assist) or something similar that you can pick up groceries in and hit the trails with, is probably right up there with R3 platform in terms of impact potential on global CO2 emissions. Consider markets outside of North America. Rivian absolutely needs to focus on short-medium term goals of establishing financial viability and ensuring quality at scale, but they can’t stop working on future projects either because it takes many years to go from concept to scaling production.

 

[s4wrxttcs]

This is the wrong move.

They should entire into some profit sharing/licensing for the massive accessories people want.

I'm sure I'm not the only Rivian owner that might be a little too gear shop obsessed.

In fact if Rivian had a Magsafe charging kit to replace the existing charging solution then I'd probably buy it.

I'd probably buy a gear tunnel fridge too.

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