With Tesla showing signs of stepping back from automotive production, Rivian has the potential to come out from under its shadow with a more affordable R2 model. Toward that end, the automaker’s founder R. J. Scaringe has been presenting Rivian as a Tesla without the controversy and chaos.
This week Tesla announced that it was discontinuing the Model S and X and reconfiguring the factory space where they are built in Fremont, California to produce Optimus robots. Company head Elon Musk tried to spin the move as the beginning of an effort to transform society with robots that result in everyone having a high income (Iliff, 2026).
This sounds as plausible to me as the breathless prediction in 1954 that nuclear power would someday be too cheap to meter (U.S. NRC, 2026).
Meanwhile, Scaringe — Musk’s counterpart over at Rivian — has been making the media rounds to drum up interest in the forthcoming R2 model. Building strong sales for the mid-sized sport-utility vehicle would seem to be crucial to the survival of the money-losing electric-vehicle automaker.
The Motley Fool (2026) recently summed up Rivian’s prospects by noting that it had “$7 billion of cash on its balance sheet at the end of the third quarter of 2025. It’s almost certain that the R2 will get built and sold. The question is whether people will buy it in large enough numbers. And there’s no way to know until the lower-priced vehicle is actually in the market.”
Scaringe does a soft shoe routine with Kara Swisher
Kara Swisher (2026) recently interviewed Scaringe for her podcast. Even though she struck me as lobbing too many softball questions, I thought the discussion was useful for a number of reasons.
Scaringe came across as the antithesis of Musk. The Rivian founder displayed admirable deftness in steering clear of saying anything politically controversial or making wildly grandiose promises. Without explicitly criticizing Tesla, he essentially made the case that his company was the leading American EV automaker for those who find Musk a bridge too far.
That said, Scaringe still displayed some high-tech sizzle. He argued that the auto industry was going through a transformation that could result in a major consolidation — and that companies with particularly strong IT capacity could have a big advantage. Of the American automakers, Scaringe pointed to Rivian and Tesla as possessing more in-house expertise than legacy automakers who had traditionally relied on a variety of suppliers in a piecemeal fashion.
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Perhaps because Swisher is more of a high-tech reporter, she didn’t ask questions one might expect of a scribe from Automotive News. For example, she didn’t press Scaringe on what was the R2’s breakeven point — and whether Rivian took too big of a financial risk in building a new plant in Georgia so quickly.
Nor did Swisher address recent reports that Rivian has experienced turbulence in its technology partnership with the Volkswagen Group (Alves, 2025). In addition, she seemed to share Scaringe’s sunny optimism about the potential for autonomous technology to transform the auto industry.
All that said, I must admit to feeling a wee bit reassured that if Tesla does implode that there is another American EV company with the potential to pick up where it left off — and without the cloud of controversy and chaos that seems to follow Musk wherever he goes.
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RE:SOURCES
- Alves, Matilde; 2025. “Rivian and Volkswagen Hold Crisis Meeting as JV Faces Slowdown: Report.” ElectricVehicles.com. Posted Sept. 19.
- Iliff, Laurence; 2026. “Tesla kills Model S sedan, Model X crossover to free factory space for Optimus humanoid robot.” Automotive News. Posted Jan. 28.
- Motley Fool; 2026. “Is Rivian Stock a Buy Now?” The Globe and Mail. Posted Jan. 28.
- Swisher, Kara; 2026. “Why Rivian’s $45,000 SUV is a make-or-break moment.” On with Kara Switsher. Posted Jan. 29.
- U.S. NRC; 2026. “‘Too Cheap to Meter’: A History of the Phrase.” Accessed Jan. 29.
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