- Electric vehicle company Rivian announced it has raised $1.3 billion led by T. Rowe Price. Existing investors Amazon and Ford also joined along with BlackRock.
Electric vehicle company Rivian announced that it has raised $1.3 billion in funding led by T. Rowe Price. Existing investors Amazon and Ford Motor Company also joined the round along with BlackRock.
“This investment demonstrates confidence in our team, products, technology, and strategy – we are extremely excited to have the support from such strong shareholders,” said Rivian Automotive chief executive officer RJ Scaringe.
This funding round is the company’s fourth in 2019. In February, the company raised $700 million in funding led by Amazon. Two months later, the company announced it raised $500 million from Ford. And in September, Cox Automotive invested $350 million in Rivian. Amazon’s investment in Rivian was strategic as the company also ordered 100,000 vans from the electric automaker with deliveries expected to start in 2021.
Launched in 2009, Rivian is planning to build an all-electric pickup truck called the R1T and an all-electric SUV called the R1S with 400+ miles of range each starting in late 2020. These vehicles will be based on a flexible “skateboard” platform and are going to be produced at the company’s manufacturing plant in Normal, Illinois.
With this round of funding, Rivian has now raised about $3.5 billion from investors in total. And the company’s valuation is believed to be somewhere well above $5 billion.
“We want to maintain a meaningful value in the ownership and future of that company,” said Ford spokesman T.R. Reid in a statement via Reuters.
