Rivian pulls out from van-making joint venture with Mercedes

13 December 2022

Rivian and Mercedes only signed the memorandum of Understanding in September of this year and the two companies were going to explore building electric commercial vehicles in Europe. That plan is out the window now with Rivian changing its course and focusing on its current offering.

Rivian decided to pull out of the agreement before it went too far and the company wants to pay more attention to its domestic market, both its consumer and business customers will likely benefit from that.

Mercedes responded to the news with understanding, the company supports Rivian’s decision and it claims its own plans are unaffected. Mercedes is ramping up preparations for its full scale production at the electric van dedicated factory in Jawor, Poland.

Although both companies cordially agreed to put their plans on hold, this is not a fully blown cancellation, at least not yet. Mercedes and Rivian, both hope they can return to the table at some point in the future when the markets are less unpredictable.

It’s an understandable decision from Rivian, the company seems to be pulling back on many of its plans and trying to focus on its main business - R1T and R1S electric trucks. It still has a huge contract to fulfil with Amazon and it already plans to bring a smaller SUV to the American market.

This decision is nothing else but an admission that Rivian was spreading its resources far too thin and thankfully someone pulled an emergency brake on this one before it went full speed into large commitments. On one hand it’s not a good look for the company that courted Mercedes to a table and then walked away but on the other hand, it shows the management is finally getting realistic about the company’s abilities and that can be read as a good signal for investors.

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