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Old 10-10-2021, 05:47 PM   #128 (permalink)
Hersbird
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JSH View Post
What gives you the idea that they aren't going to continue to build trucks at the same time as the vans?

Their contract with Amazon is for 100K vans over 10 years with the first 10,000 due by the end of 2022. That isn't a lot of vehicles to keep an auto plant going - only about 35 a day through the end of 2022 (assuming 6 weeks of shutdown)

EDIT: After reading the Bloomberg article that touched this off two thing are important.

1. Rivian's CEO said the truck will be produced at a steady but modest volume. What does modest mean?
2. Rivian's CEO said it would take two years to build the vehicles they have orders for. 50,000 orders / 2 - 25,000 trucks per year.

So if those number hold that means they will be building twice as many trucks as vans.
But they also said they will be "concentrating" on the vans. Making more pickups than vans doesn't sound like concentrating on vans. I think they could make 50,000 pickups in 2 years, say 10,000 in 2022 and 40,000 in 2023, but I bet you don't see them make more than 5,000 any year going forward. I bet 2022 it will be all they can do to get the first 10,000 vans done on time. Even Ford says it will be all they can do to make 18000 Lightnings the first year and they have been at this awhile now.
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