Rivian is looking to follow Tesla and a number of electric-vehicle startups into the public markets later this year or in 2022 at a valuation that will likely highlight surging excitement around EVs.
Bloomberg reported on Tuesday that Rivian is considering a 2021 IPO and seeking a valuation of $50 billion or more. That would be a striking number for a 12-year-old company that may go public with just a few months of revenue under its belt — Rivian plans to start delivering its first two models this summer. It would also top by more than 3,700% the valuation of around $1.3 billion Tesla received just before its 2010 IPO, which came two years after it put its first electric sports cars on the road.
A lot has changed in the EV industry since then. A decade ago, there was plenty of doubt about whether Tesla could gain traction and less enthusiasm about the future of EVs, Reilly Brennan, a general partner at Trucks, a venture-capital firm focused on transportation technology, told Insider.
Since then, Tesla has built a passionate customer base, started earning consistent profits, and convinced investors it's worth more than any other automaker. Meanwhile, national, state, and municipal governments have introduced a range of policies related to EVs, including subsidies, tougher vehicle-emission standards, and in some cases plans to ban the sale of gas-powered vehicles in the coming decades. Some experts believe consumers will buy more EVs than gas-powered vehicles by 2040.
"We used to think of electrification as a subset of transportation," Brennan said. Now it's "becoming the transportation business."
The combination of Tesla's emergence as a credible competitor to the likes of Volkswagen and BMW and the increasing momentum behind EV adoption has helped spur a rapid succession of public listings for EV startups over the past year.
Some of those companies are "a little bit more story than reality" at this point, Brennan said, but Rivian has a number of assets that set it apart. The company has been refining its technology for more than a decade, boasts a range of big-name investors and partners — including Amazon, Ford, and BlackRock — and is focused on the SUV and pickup segments that dominate the North America market.
While Brennan said it's difficult to predict whether IPO investors would be willing to pay enough for Rivian shares to support a $50 billion valuation, he wouldn't be surprised if a year from now, Rivian has outpaced GM's current valuation of $80.27 billion.
"It's definitely the EV company I'm most excited to watch," Brennan said.
Are you a current or former Rivian employee? Do you have a news tip or opinion you'd like to share? Contact this reporter at mmatousek@insider.com, on Signal at 646-768-4712, or via his encrypted email address mmatousek@protonmail.com.
