Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: We welcome our global radio and TV audiences. Now. Evmaker
Speaker 2: Rivian recently announcing it will be spinning out a new
Speaker 2: company called Also, with the aim to develop evs for
Speaker 2: short trips one hundred and five million dollar funding from
Speaker 2: Rivian and VC firm Eclipse for More. I'm very pleased
Speaker 2: to say we're welcoming Eclipse partner Jettin Bell and Rivian
Speaker 2: CEO RJ Scarrange. Great to have you both here, and
Speaker 2: RJ I start with you the spin out of Also Now,
Speaker 2: why is it better now to let it thrive in
Speaker 2: a solo manner?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, well thanks for having us on. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 3: we think about overall transportation space and what needs to happen.
Speaker 3: Of course, there's electrification of vehicles and the infrastructure that
Speaker 3: we know of today, and that's what Rivian's been focused on.
Speaker 3: Of course, first the United States and you know with
Speaker 3: our R two program soon in Europe. But there's a
Speaker 3: lot of trips and a lot of miles that are
Speaker 3: much shorter distance and actually work better with something that's
Speaker 3: a much smaller form factor. And so we kicked off
Speaker 3: a skunkworks team a few years ago to look at
Speaker 3: how we could take our core technology stack can apply
Speaker 3: it in a very low cost, much smaller form factor.
Speaker 3: And as that played out, we realized that the idea
Speaker 3: was really had a lot of had a lot of legs.
Speaker 4: It was a.
Speaker 3: Powerful idea, and we decided that this idea was big
Speaker 3: enough to deserve being its own business, and so we
Speaker 3: took the decision to spin it out. Eclipse led the
Speaker 3: financing of that with one hundred and five million dollars investment,
Speaker 3: as you said, and we're really excited about what's the
Speaker 3: comt We haven't shown any of the products yet, but
Speaker 3: they're absolutely incredible.
Speaker 2: Let's therefore ask you, Jane, how is this relationship going
Speaker 2: to evolve? What's the sort of closeness you're going to
Speaker 2: be doing because r J is going to be on
Speaker 2: the board.
Speaker 5: Yes, I think it's exciting because I spent many years
Speaker 5: at Rivian working closely with RJ, and now in this
Speaker 5: new role at Eclipse, you know, really excited to invest
Speaker 5: in this opportunity and really disrupt the micromobility space. Yeah,
Speaker 5: I'm really excited to partner again with RJ and the
Speaker 5: Rivin team as well as the Also team. To, you know,
Speaker 5: bring this vision to life.
Speaker 2: Jten, I ask you the consumer issues here though we're
Speaker 2: a little bit worried, to say the least about the
Speaker 2: economy here in the US. Do you think that the
Speaker 2: consumer is going to be there to back this more
Speaker 2: than one hundred million dollars that you're putting behind this
Speaker 2: offering that starts to get into our hands in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty six.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Absolutely.
Speaker 5: I think if you look at the transportation ecosystem around
Speaker 5: the world, it's under so much of stress when it
Speaker 5: comes to infrastructure limitations, when it comes to congestion, comes
Speaker 5: to pollution, and micromobility is a very important piece of
Speaker 5: that puzzle. You know, more cars, more buses, more trains
Speaker 5: is not going to be the answer. You need something smaller,
Speaker 5: something more flexible to complement those other modalities, and we
Speaker 5: believe that micromobility is a perfect solution to that. It's
Speaker 5: a large market already, it's growing very rapidly around the world.
Speaker 5: But if you look at the solutions, you know they're
Speaker 5: very weig technically, very poor user experience. They lack reliability,
Speaker 5: and this is where the opportunity is. And I think
Speaker 5: the consumer is waiting for something more compelling to.
Speaker 4: Hit the market.
Speaker 2: Ah, Jay, it's a global opportunity on micro mobility, and
Speaker 2: you just talked about how it's a global opportunity for
Speaker 2: you right now with Rivian and they are two roll out.
Speaker 2: This is a difficult time to be a global business.
Speaker 2: How are you preparing yourself to access the European market
Speaker 2: when we're worrying about tariffs and you've always set aside
Speaker 2: hundreds of millions of dollars in potential policy.
Speaker 3: Implod Yeah, I mean it's you know, it's a very
Speaker 3: complex environment. You know, as Rivian, we're spending a lot
Speaker 3: of time interpreting and understanding what the teriff implications are
Speaker 3: for us, of course here in the United States, but
Speaker 3: I think importantly recognizing that, you know, in particular Europe
Speaker 3: may respond and so how the ultimately the teriff structure
Speaker 3: sets out and lays out is going to have a
Speaker 3: big impact on some of the decisions to make over
Speaker 3: the next year.
Speaker 4: We're staying very very close to it. But it's, as
Speaker 4: you've called out.
Speaker 3: It's a very dynamic situation and I think some of
Speaker 3: the uncertainty is what makes it the most challenging to navigate.
Speaker 2: Oh, Ja, are you in close discussions with the administration itself,
Speaker 2: have you been getting a glean and what they're thinking
Speaker 2: of for the future.
Speaker 3: Well, I think, you know, one of the things to
Speaker 3: that's important just if we take a big step back
Speaker 3: from all the noise of what's happening. You know it's
Speaker 3: going to happen tomorrow with some of the tariffs that
Speaker 3: have been talked about and will be rolled out. I
Speaker 3: think big step back is there's a clear directive to
Speaker 3: drive technology and manufacturing into the United States.
Speaker 4: And for Yvian, we're a US company.
Speaker 3: We have just under seventeen thousand employees here here in
Speaker 3: the US. We have a plant in Chicago or just
Speaker 3: south of Chicago and Normal, Illinois, and we're building another
Speaker 3: plant in Georgia. So we're growing rapid here in the
Speaker 3: United State. It's one hundred percent of our vehicles that
Speaker 3: they are produced here and all of our technologies here.
Speaker 3: So in terms of the administration's objectives, we're very aligned
Speaker 3: with what's being asked and what I think the overall policy.
Speaker 4: Framework is trying to drive towards.
Speaker 3: But you know, in terms of how that translates to
Speaker 3: our expansion in Europe and elsewhere, you know, we do
Speaker 3: have to recognize that it's a very dynamic environment. Our
Speaker 3: production footprint may be different than we'll be originally planning.
Speaker 4: But I think all of us, you know.
Speaker 3: Across all the different auto manufacturers are waiting to see
Speaker 3: how things look once it does settles.
Speaker 2: That uncertainty, Jaten, I'm sure is affecting you as a
Speaker 2: team of operators investors. How are your other founders coping
Speaker 2: with this moment?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think uncertainty is the key word here. I
Speaker 5: feel that what is in our control is to focus
Speaker 5: on two things. Making sure that founders building in the
Speaker 5: physical industries have the maximum control on the stack, you know,
Speaker 5: on what they design, what they engineer. If you have
Speaker 5: control over it, then you're able to make decisions to
Speaker 5: optimize around different environments. And the second thing is to
Speaker 5: build that resilience and flexibility in the supply chain so
Speaker 5: that it is able to navigate again short term, medium term,
Speaker 5: and long term changes in the policy environment. So I
Speaker 5: think the key word there for our founders is control
Speaker 5: the controllables. There are things are going to change, things
Speaker 5: are going to change back. I think what is most
Speaker 5: important is to build a resilient strategy and a supply
Speaker 5: chain network within the company that can navigate all these
Speaker 5: different environments.
Speaker 2: A Jay a quick thirty second one for you. Do
Speaker 2: you think you've benefited from people moving away from Tesla
Speaker 2: for political reasons?
Speaker 3: Well, you know, one of the things that I think
Speaker 3: is often missed is we think about electrification. Is today
Speaker 3: only about eight percent new vehicle sales are electric here
Speaker 3: in the United States, And so when we think about
Speaker 3: competition and growing our market share, the biggest opportunity is
Speaker 3: bringing people into our new technology vehicles and introducing people
Speaker 3: into what it feels like to be in a connected, smart,
Speaker 3: of course electric vehicle. And so we really believe there
Speaker 3: needs to be a lot of choice in order for
Speaker 3: us to go from eight percent to fifty percent to
Speaker 3: eventually one hundred percent, we need lots of successful companies.
Speaker 3: We mean Tesla be successful, we continue to be very successful.
Speaker 3: We need Review to be successful, We need the existing
Speaker 3: legacy manufacturers to be successful. And so with our our
Speaker 3: two program, it's a much lower price vehicle. It's really cool,
Speaker 3: it's an incredible product. But what that'll do is we'll
Speaker 3: give customers another choice. And so we think the presence
Speaker 3: of another choice is going to be important from a
Speaker 3: brand and product attributes point of view.
Speaker 2: Thank you both so much for your clarity of thought
Speaker 2: today when there is not much clarity in the economy.
Speaker 2: Jtenbo of Eclipse, r J. Scarrange of Rivian. Great to
Speaker 2: have you both on the show. Thank you.