Online retail giant Amazon announced its plans to be completely carbon neutral by 2040. To help the company achieve this goal, Rivian will provide 100,000 electric vans.
Amazon will soon have new electric delivery vans designed, built, and exclusively serviced by Rivian. A representative for the startup confirmed that the vans will not be sold for the public, but it will be a dedicated electric delivery vehicle for the online retailer.
According to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, the company is planning to buy 100,000 units. Meanwhile, Rivian plans that the first Amazon delivery vehicle will hit the road come 2021.
The order, which was confirmed via tweet by David Clark, Amazon's senior vice president of operations, is the largest order for electric delivery vehicles to date.
Our fleet is Electrifying! Thrilled to announce the order of 100,000 electric delivery vehicles – the largest order of electric delivery vehicles ever. Look out for the new vans starting in 2021. pic.twitter.com/y5qYpuy2WP — Dave Clark (@davehclark) September 19, 2019
Rivian also revealed that the production of Amazon's EV wouldn't interfere with the production of its R1T and R1S trucks. The startup will build the delivery vehicles in the same facility in Illinois, where the R1T and R1S vehicles are being assembled.
By 2022, Rivian should have 10,000 of the electric vans hitting the road with Amazon's packages. As mentioned, the full deployment will see 100,000 of them on the road. What's more, the full fleet is expected to save around 4 million metric tons of C02 from releasing into the atmosphere each year.
Plymouth, Michigan-based Rivian, founded in 2009, has raised close to $1.9 billion from investors, including a $700 million February round led by Amazon. Just last week it received a large investment from Cox Automotive. Ford has also invested in the startup this year in order for its skateboard electric-vehicle architecture to materialize into an EV.
Rivian's first vehicles, the R1T and R1S, will hit the market in late 2020. The startup will provide updates regarding the progress of Amazon's electric van in the near future.
″[We] will have prototypes on the road next year, but 100,000 deployed by 2024," Bezos said during comments at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. "So a lot of these things, we don't have magic crystal balls to look into the future, but those are a pretty good timeline."
