Rivian’s CEO on Tesla’s Cybertruck, Ferrari’s Luce, and What Happens If the R2 Fails

Rivian 首席执行官谈特斯拉 Cybertruck、法拉利 Luce 以及 R2 若失败的后果

RJ Scaringe got his PhD from MIT studying internal combustion engines. Then he founded a company to make them obsolete. In 2009, fresh out of grad school, he launched what would become Rivian. The company spent nearly a decade in stealth mode before arriving at the 2018 LA Auto Show with two electric rides nobody had seen coming. RJ Scaringe 在麻省理工学院攻读博士学位时研究的是内燃机。随后，他创立了一家旨在让内燃机成为历史的公司。2009 年，刚从研究生院毕业的他创办了后来被称为 Rivian 的公司。该公司在隐身模式下度过了近十年，直到 2018 年洛杉矶车展上，才带着两款令人意想不到的电动汽车亮相。

The road, however, hasn’t been easy. Rivian lost $3.6 billion in 2025, and has burned through nearly $25 billion in the past eight years. It has spent more money over the same period than almost every other pure EV maker. Rivian’s IPO was the largest worldwide in 2021, and one of the largest in US history, within days valuing the company at over $100 billion. Its stock has dropped from a high of $130 to around $16. Since the R1 went on sale in 2021, Rivian has sold 175,000 cars. In the same time, Tesla has sold 8 million. 然而，这条路并不平坦。Rivian 在 2025 年亏损了 36 亿美元，过去八年里烧掉了近 250 亿美元。在同一时期，它的支出超过了几乎所有其他纯电动汽车制造商。Rivian 在 2021 年的 IPO 是当年全球规模最大的 IPO，也是美国历史上规模最大的 IPO 之一，公司市值在几天内就超过了 1000 亿美元。如今，其股价已从 130 美元的高点跌至 16 美元左右。自 2021 年 R1 开售以来，Rivian 售出了 17.5 万辆汽车，而同期特斯拉售出了 800 万辆。

But in 2024, Volkswagen Group committed up to $5.8 billion to co-develop software and electrical architecture technology with Rivian in a huge joint venture. This year, Uber announced it will invest up to $1.25 billion in Rivian to build and deploy up to 50,000 fully autonomous robotaxis. Regardless, the company needs its new R2 SUV to work. Not just sell, but sell in large numbers. 但在 2024 年，大众汽车集团承诺投入高达 58 亿美元，与 Rivian 成立大型合资企业，共同开发软件和电气架构技术。今年，Uber 宣布将向 Rivian 投资高达 12.5 亿美元，用于制造和部署多达 5 万辆全自动驾驶出租车。无论如何，该公司都需要其新款 R2 SUV 取得成功——不仅要卖出去，还要实现大规模销售。

I sat down with Scaringe for a candid, wide-ranging discussion on what happens if the R2 fails, why the R1 launched with dead-end tech, how to compete with China, the Cybertruck’s failure, and the virtue of buttons inside cars. But we started on easier ground: his thoughts on the most polarizing EV of 2026. (This interview has been edited for length and clarity.) 我与 Scaringe 进行了一场坦诚且广泛的讨论，内容涵盖了如果 R2 失败会发生什么、为什么 R1 发布时采用了死胡同技术、如何与中国竞争、Cybertruck 的失败，以及车内实体按键的优点。但我们从一个轻松的话题开始：他对 2026 年最具争议性的电动汽车的看法。（本文经过删减和整理。）

JEREMY WHITE: What do you think about Ferrari’s Luce? JEREMY WHITE：你对法拉利 Luce 有什么看法？

RJ SCARINGE: The way Jony [Ive] and Marc [Newson] approach design is incredibly intentional, so there’s not a decision on that car that’s unintentional. Through that lens, you have to look at it in a different light. It’s definitely different than what people were expecting. RJ SCARINGE： Jony [Ive] 和 Marc [Newson] 的设计方式非常讲究，那辆车上的每一个决定都不是随意的。从这个角度来看，你必须以不同的眼光去审视它。它确实与人们预期的不同。

Do you like the Luce, though? 但你喜欢 Luce 吗？

Would I buy it? I don’t own a Ferrari. There are things about it I really like. Parts of the interior are just phenomenal, like how beautifully well executed the haptics, the switches, the buttons are. You can see Jony’s fingerprints all over it. 我会买吗？我不拥有法拉利。但我确实喜欢它的一些地方。内饰部分非常出色，比如触觉反馈、开关和按钮的执行效果非常精美。你可以随处看到 Jony 的设计印记。

It’s just great to see more EV choice, because, particularly in the United States, there’s such a void. About 50 or 60 percent of the market share is two vehicles: the Model 3 and the Model Y. These have been on the road for a while, yet they outsell everything else. If we want to electrify, we need to have a lot more choice than just those two. 很高兴看到有更多的电动汽车选择，因为特别是在美国，市场存在巨大的空白。大约 50% 到 60% 的市场份额被两款车占据：Model 3 和 Model Y。它们上市已经有一段时间了，但销量依然超过其他所有车型。如果我们想要实现电动化，我们需要比这两款车更多的选择。

Have you been surprised at the Cybertruck’s failure? 你对 Cybertruck 的失败感到惊讶吗？

You sometimes take big swings with something that’s wild, and they definitely took a very big swing. It’s turned out it’s not a mass-market product, but it was pretty clear from the beginning that it wasn’t going to be. It was very, very niche in terms of some of the design decisions and product trade-offs [Tesla] made. Cybertruck is the exact opposite of the Model 3 and Model Y. Those aren’t products that push anybody away. I applaud the courage in doing a product like that, but it’s going to end up very niche for them. 有时你会对一些疯狂的想法进行大胆尝试，他们确实做出了非常大胆的尝试。事实证明，它不是一款大众市场产品，但从一开始就很清楚它不会是。就 [特斯拉] 所做的一些设计决策和产品权衡而言，它非常、非常小众。Cybertruck 与 Model 3 和 Model Y 完全相反。后者不是那种会把人拒之门外的产品。我赞赏他们做出这样产品的勇气，但它最终对他们来说将是非常小众的。

Polestar’s in a bit of a mess, isn’t it? 极星（Polestar）现在有点乱，不是吗？

To be an at-scale player, the price needs to be right, the technology integration needs to be solid, and the overall package has to be compelling to a broad enough audience: things like acceleration, efficiency, packaging. Then there’s the intangible. Does the design have enough interest that it draws people in, but at the same time inviting and broad enough to appeal to large numbers? 要成为一家规模化厂商，价格必须合适，技术整合必须扎实，整体方案必须对足够广泛的受众具有吸引力：比如加速、效率、空间布局等。然后是无形的东西。设计是否足够有趣以吸引人们，同时又足够亲和且广泛，能吸引大量用户？

That is the challenge Polestar has. They haven’t gotten that combination quite right. The cars look great. I don’t think it’s a design issue. But I do think the whole package—price, content, features—just hasn’t connected with consumers in the way that we hope R2 does, or certainly like a Model Y has connected. The fact that Tesla vehicles have such significant market share [in the US] is not a reflection of a healthy market. It’s a reflection of a wildly underserved market. 这就是极星面临的挑战。他们还没有完全掌握这种组合。车看起来很棒，我不认为这是设计问题。但我确实认为整个方案——价格、内容、功能——并没有像我们希望 R2 那样，或者像 Model Y 那样与消费者产生共鸣。特斯拉汽车在 [美国] 拥有如此巨大的市场份额，这并不反映市场健康，而是反映了一个严重服务不足的市场。

So much is riding on R2. What’s the plan if it fails? R2 承载了太多期望。如果它失败了，有什么计划？

We build software in-house, electronics in-house. We build our own in-house silicon. We design and build all of our motors, all our own gearboxes, all of our power electronics—everything completely in-house. And if Rivian stayed a 50,000-unit-a-year company, that would be an extraordinarily expensive way to do that. 我们自主研发软件、电子设备。我们自主研发芯片。我们设计并制造所有的电机、变速箱、电力电子设备——一切都是完全自主研发的。如果 Rivian 维持在年产 5 万辆的规模，那将是一种极其昂贵的经营方式。

We have our own sales locations. We’ve built out our own service network. Many billions of dollars have flowed into that. We own parts distribution, we own vehicle distribution. We have giant parking lots and vehicle prep centers across the country. We built all that contemplating R2. 我们有自己的销售网点。我们建立了完善的服务网络。数十亿美元投入其中。我们拥有零部件配送和车辆配送体系。我们在全国各地拥有巨大的停车场和车辆整备中心。我们构建这一切都是为了 R2。

And so that means, leading up to R2, we spent a lot of money. It’s not an accident. It’s an intention. It’s the plan. But the plan is to be a large company. The plan is for R2 to work. So if R2 doesn’t work, if R2 were to be a flop, we would have to really take a step back and really reconfigure the business. To have a 6,000-person engineering team to sell 50,000 vehicles just wouldn’t make sense. To be vertically integrating deep down to the silicon as we have would be impossible to rationalize. 这意味着在 R2 发布之前，我们投入了大量资金。这不是意外，而是意图，是计划的一部分。但我们的计划是成为一家大公司。计划是让 R2 成功。所以如果 R2 不成功，如果它失败了，我们必须退后一步，重新配置业务。拥有 6000 人的工程团队却只卖 5 万辆车是说不通的。像我们这样深入到芯片层面的垂直整合将无法合理化。

So, absolutely, the future of the company as we’ve designed it depends on R2’s success. The goal was to be a big company, so the intention was for R2 to grow significantly. But to prepare for a product that’s going to be high volume, we had to make all these decisions to support it. 所以，毫无疑问，我们所设计的公司未来取决于 R2 的成功。我们的目标是成为一家大公司，因此 R2 的初衷就是实现大幅增长。但为了准备一款高销量的产品，我们必须做出所有这些决定来支持它。

One thing we’ve done that’s also been helpful is that the Normal facility [in Illinois] has 155,000 units of capacity. We’ve started construction on the follow-on facility, a plant in Georgia that’s going to be built across two phases. Originally it was going to be 200,000, but we made the decision… 我们所做的一件有益的事情是，诺莫尔工厂 [位于伊利诺伊州] 拥有 15.5 万辆的产能。我们已经开始建设后续设施，即位于佐治亚州的工厂，该工厂将分两个阶段建设。最初计划产能为 20 万辆，但我们做出了决定……