Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe Didn’t want to be his EV company Tesla 2.0.
Scaringe discussed his and Elon Musk’s automotive companies during Kleiner Perkins’ “Grit” podcast on Monday. Tesla is still a dominant player and has a leg up on Rivian, which Scarring founded in 2009 at the age of 26.
Musk’s tenure as Tesla’s CEO began in 2008, the same year that Tesla first opened its doors to customers. Roadster sports car.
“Tesla has been absolutely inspiring,” Schering said during the podcast. “The thing that was very important to me with Rivian was that we weren’t covering the same ground as Tesla.”
While the host pointed out that Rivian initially follows Tesla’s playbook and plans to build it. Electric sports carSchering said he made a “deliberate” choice to forge his own path.
“If you think about starting a car company, you want to create a brand that appeals to enthusiasts,” he said.
Scaringe said he is a fan of sports cars, so “the logical place to start is to build a sports car, use it to build a brand, and follow it up with more mass-market vehicles.”
“That, of course, is how Tesla’s strategy worked, and it worked incredibly well for them,” he said.
Scaringe added that their decision to pivot to a different type of EV product, vehicle topology and experience was “a very deliberate attempt to create a new story.”
“Not just for us as a company or a brand but, importantly, to help change more mindsets around what sustainable transportation can look like,” he said.
Representatives for Rivian and Tesla did not immediately respond to Business Insider’s request for comment.
Rivian currently sells R1S SUV And R1T pickup truck. Schering announced two more vehicles on the way — R2 SUV and R3 SUV – in March.
The EV industry experienced a slowdown in sales and growth this summer. In July, Scarring told The Verge He believes the issue is “really a huge lack of choice”.
“If you want to spend less than $50,000 for an EV, I’d say there are very few great products out there,” he said.
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