Rivian just delivered its best quarter and raised guidance for the year. Q2 deliveries hit 12,194 vehicles, beating the company’s own target by over 1,000 units. Full-year outlook climbed to 65,000 to 70,000 deliveries. The stock surged 13%.
The catalyst is the R2 - Rivian’s first mass-market SUV, which started reaching customers on June 9 at $57,990. It’s built to take on Tesla’s Model Y directly, with 330 miles of range, more cargo space, and genuine off-road capability. Motor1 called it “the Model Y’s first real threat.”
But this is a company that has burned through $27 billion since founding and trades 76% below its IPO price. US EV sales fell 28% in Q1, the federal tax credit is gone, and the R2 starts at $57,990 today - the $45,000 base won’t ship until next summer.
Has stock either just found its floor? Or is the R2 one more expensive bet from a company that can’t stop making them.
Here's how the community voted
The R2’s bill of materials is roughly 50% lower than the R1, giving Rivian its first vehicle with mass-market unit economics. Reservation demand exceeded 100,000 before the first unit shipped. TD Cowen projects annual R2 sales of 212,000 to 335,000 units at maturity - more than five times Rivian’s total 2025 deliveries of 42,247.
Volkswagen has committed $5.8 billion to a joint venture built on Rivian’s software architecture, with $3.3 billion deployed so far, scaling across up to 30 million VW vehicles. VW is the largest shareholder at 15.9%, with Amazon at 11.8%. Amazon has 30,000+ Rivian vans on the road out of a 100,000-unit commitment. Uber signed a $1.25 billion deal for up to 50,000 autonomous R2 robotaxis.
Unit economics are moving fast in the right direction. Average selling price rose $5,500 per vehicle in 2025 while costs per unit fell $9,500. The Normal, Illinois plant is ramping to 215,000 units annually, with a 300,000-unit Georgia plant backed by a $4.5 billion DOE loan opening in 2028. Rivian expects to exit 2026 with positive automotive gross profit for the first time.
Rivian has accumulated $27.4 billion in losses since founding. Q1 free cash flow was negative $1.08 billion, and full-year adjusted EBITDA is guided at negative $1.8 to $2.1 billion. Long-term debt sits at $4.4 billion against $5.4 billion in liquidity. The path to EBITDA breakeven, originally targeted for 2027, was quietly pushed back in a March SEC filing.
The EV market is contracting hard. The federal $7,500 tax credit was eliminated last fall, and US sales fell 28% in Q1. Ford killed the all-electric F-150 Lightning after demand collapsed. Rivian scored worst in J.D. Power’s 2025 quality study at 274 problems per 100 vehicles - 43% above the industry average.
Shares outstanding have grown 49% since IPO, from 860 million to 1.28 billion. Amazon accounts for 52% of automotive revenue - extreme single-customer concentration. To hit even the low end of its raised guidance, Rivian needs to average over 21,000 deliveries per quarter in H2, a 74% jump from Q2 and a pace the company has never come close to achieving.
The R2’s bill of materials is roughly 50% lower than the R1, giving Rivian its first vehicle with mass-market unit economics. Reservation demand exceeded 100,000 before the first unit shipped. TD Cowen projects annual R2 sales of 212,000 to 335,000 units at maturity - more than five times Rivian’s total 2025 deliveries of 42,247.
Volkswagen has committed $5.8 billion to a joint venture built on Rivian’s software architecture, with $3.3 billion deployed so far, scaling across up to 30 million VW vehicles. VW is the largest shareholder at 15.9%, with Amazon at 11.8%. Amazon has 30,000+ Rivian vans on the road out of a 100,000-unit commitment. Uber signed a $1.25 billion deal for up to 50,000 autonomous R2 robotaxis.
Unit economics are moving fast in the right direction. Average selling price rose $5,500 per vehicle in 2025 while costs per unit fell $9,500. The Normal, Illinois plant is ramping to 215,000 units annually, with a 300,000-unit Georgia plant backed by a $4.5 billion DOE loan opening in 2028. Rivian expects to exit 2026 with positive automotive gross profit for the first time.
Rivian has accumulated $27.4 billion in losses since founding. Q1 free cash flow was negative $1.08 billion, and full-year adjusted EBITDA is guided at negative $1.8 to $2.1 billion. Long-term debt sits at $4.4 billion against $5.4 billion in liquidity. The path to EBITDA breakeven, originally targeted for 2027, was quietly pushed back in a March SEC filing.
The EV market is contracting hard. The federal $7,500 tax credit was eliminated last fall, and US sales fell 28% in Q1. Ford killed the all-electric F-150 Lightning after demand collapsed. Rivian scored worst in J.D. Power’s 2025 quality study at 274 problems per 100 vehicles - 43% above the industry average.
Shares outstanding have grown 49% since IPO, from 860 million to 1.28 billion. Amazon accounts for 52% of automotive revenue - extreme single-customer concentration. To hit even the low end of its raised guidance, Rivian needs to average over 21,000 deliveries per quarter in H2, a 74% jump from Q2 and a pace the company has never come close to achieving.
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This is a slightly tougher one to call, because it has a VC-style element to investing in a company that has to reach profitability in a cyclical end market. All that said, if oil prices remain higher, more and more may want EVs and Rivian could be very well positioned. VW may prefer to just acquire Rivian at some point and bolt it into their existing business and/or make use of idle capacity at their other factories. The Rivian cars also seem compelling and consumer adoption of EV technology is improving with more recognizing how feasible it is to own one when you can charge at home or work every day. The risks are plenty though, including future competition from Chinese EVs, a weakening consumer (straddled with higher interest rates and inflationary pressures on the pocketbook), long runway until the firm can be profitable, and the ever-present product/warranty risk. I'm not thrilled by the price and hurdles they have to overcome to make this a part of the portfolio, but the company appears to be executing well and creating products that consumers are interested in, so I can't knock them in any way - it's just beyond my narrow preferences for an investment. I have to label it as a dud as a result.