Rivian, an electric truck and van maker, is going public with a stock price of roughly $70 billion, a staggering figure that reflects Wall Street’s perception that the fast-growing electric vehicle sector is still a wide-open field.
Rivian said it would sell its shares in the sale for $78 in a securities filing on Tuesday. It will raise around $12 billion with that amount. That amount would be higher than Uber’s initial public offering (IPO) in 2019, which raised $8 billion.
Rivian shares will begin trading on the Nasdaq exchange on Wednesday under the symbol RIVN. Rivian’s market capitalization would be close to $70 billion, putting it on par with Ford Motor, which is valued at $80 billion and sold more than four million vehicles globally last year.
The offering’s market climate has been shattered this week, as shares in Tesla, the largest electric-car manufacturer, have plummeted after its CEO, Elon Musk, announced he could sell part of his stake.
Rivian has a voracious thirst for money. It raised over $10 billion from investors including Amazon and Ford before this I.P.O., and it expects to spend billions as it tries to ramp up production of its three vehicles: an upscale pickup truck aimed at off-roading drivers; a sport utility vehicle; and a delivery van developed with Amazon, which owns a significant stake in Rivian and has ordered 100,000 vans.
Rivian and many other automakers are banking that during the next decade, consumers will be ready to make the switch to electric vehicles. General Motors has stated that it intends to phase out gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035. Tesla, which is on course to sell almost one million electric vehicles globally this year, has a market capitalization of $1 trillion, surpassing the combined value of General Motors, Ford, Toyota Motor, Volkswagen, BMW, and a number of other automakers.
Much now hinges on Rivian’s ability to scale up manufacturing to fulfil client demand. Tesla had a difficult time producing its vehicle in big quantities for several months.
Rivian had only delivered 156 of its trucks, known as the R1T, by the end of last month; it hopes to begin delivery of the S.U.V., the R1S, next month. It said in a financial filing that it did not anticipate completing the 55,400 truck and SUV orders until the end of 2023, emphasising that getting manufacturing lines churning out considerable quantities of cars would take time.
Rivian, like other electric vehicle companies that went public this year, is losing a lot of money. It lost $994 million in the first half of this year, almost as much as it lost in the entire year of 2020, when it lost $1.02 billion. For a while, investors may be ready to put up with losses. In theory, the Amazon van deal should ensure a continuous revenue stream.
Editor’s note: This article originally appeared on The New York Times