US electric vehicle startup Rivian produced a total of 4401 vehicles in the second quarter of 2022, representing more than half of its production to date.
Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe said on Twitter this higher second quarter production tally is due to a production ramp-up and an easing of supply chain challenges.
Scaringe also said the company is “on track” to achieve its annual production goal of 25,000 vehicles in 2022.
As previously reported, Rivian was (and most likely still is) grappling with high shipping costs and supply chain issues which lead to it producing 2553 vehicles in the first quarter of 2022.
It also posted a quarterly net loss of $US1.59 billion ($A2.32 billion) in the first quarter, which followed an almost $US2.5 billion ($A3.65 billion) loss in the first quarter of 2021.
Following this, Ford offloaded a little over $US400 million ($A584 million) of its shares in Rivian in May 2022. The Blue Oval still holds almost 87 million Rivian shares, however.
Rivian first went public in November 2021 where it was offering holders the option to invest in the company at $US78 ($A114) per share. At the time it was billed as the biggest initial float since Facebook.
Shares previously peaked at around $US179.47 ($A260.84) per share on November 16, 2021, and recently reached as low as $US19.25 ($A28.17) in early May 2022.
This positive second-quarter production news for Rivian improved the share price by around $US4 ($A5.85) almost overnight, with the price currently hovering around $US31.60 ($A46.19).
Rivian recently said it’s now “ramping up production and deliveries” of its R1T ute, R1S SUV and EDV700 long-wheelbase van.
Both Ford and Amazon are major stakeholders in Rivian and they both recently reported first-quarter losses due largely to their investment in the EV startup.
It’s unclear if this will be a similar story for the second quarter of 2022 as neither company has released its second quarter results yet.
In November 2021 Ford and Rivian cancelled their jointly develop EV project which was going to see Rivian’s skateboard EV architecture underpin a Ford and a Lincoln.
Going ahead, however, is Rivian’s EDV delivery van, which is developed in collaboration with Amazon. The e-commerce giant has 100,000 of them on order.
Rivian has beaten rival automakers to the punch in producing an all-electric ute, with its R1T beating the likes of the Tesla Cybertruck, GMC Hummer EV and Ford F-150 Lightning to market.
The company began production late in 2021, and the company is expanding its Normal, Illinois plant, which it brought from Mitsubishi, and is opening a second facility in Georgia.
Rivian has yet to lock in plans for an Australian introduction, but previously said in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission that it plans to enter major Asia-Pacific markets, among other.
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