Rivian CEO Says Volkswagen's $20K EV Built On Its Tech Is Europe's 'Answer To China' - And Even BYD, Xiaomi, Xpeng Will Buy It

Rivian Automotive CEO RJ Scaringe believes the EV maker's $5.8 billion technology alliance with Volkswagen Group will underpin the German automaker's planned ID.1, a $20,000 EV he called Europe's“answer to China.” 

Speaking at Morgan Stanley's 13th Annual Laguna Conference on Thursday evening, Scaringe said the launch would draw close attention from competitors.

“Every car company will buy it. BYD will buy it. Xiaomi will buy it and XPeng will buy it,” he said. He added that they would be“impressed” by the vehicle's network architecture, ECU layout and electrical systems, which were designed to scale from VW's entry-level models to Porsche and Audi flagships.

R2 Autonomy To Leap Beyond Highways

Scaringe also spotlighted Rivian's own product pipeline, led by the $45,000 R2 five-passenger SUV. While Rivian already offers hands-free driving on highways, he said the next step is“hands-free everywhere,” followed by“eyes-off” operation and eventually turn-by-turn autonomy. 

He said that the shift represents“something like a 50x increase in the number of roads that the vehicle is going to be able to drive on, driving itself.”

The company plans to hold an event at the end of the year to showcase its autonomy technology, including hardware details, its compute and perception stack, and demonstrations of the system in operation.

Scaringe forecast that hands-free driving on all roads will expand next year, with“eyes-off” autonomy targeted for 2027–2028. He said that if executed well, the feature could“unlock massive pools of demand” and significantly expand Rivian's customer base.

Data Flywheel Powers Rivian's AI Training

Rivian's Gen2 system marks a clean break from the Mobileye-based setup in its first vehicles. Scaringe said Rivian brought its compute, sensors and perception fully in-house, enabling the company to build a“data flywheel” to train its autonomy system using real-world driving data collected from its fleet.

He said Rivian's smaller vehicle base compared with Tesla's is offset by advanced camera and radar systems, particularly 3D imaging radar, which helps improve training in difficult conditions like rain or fog.

Not Enough EV Choices Under $50K

Scaringe reiterated that EV adoption in the U.S. remains stuck at around 8% because of limited options for mainstream buyers.“The number of great choices [under $50,000] is well under the number of fingers on my hand,” he said, pointing to Tesla's Model 3 and Model Y as the only broadly compelling choices today. He described R2 as designed to fill that gap with a more affordable crossover alternative.

He added that“there's going to be some cross-shop and maybe some movement of customers from Tesla to Rivian,” though he emphasized the bigger opportunity is in reaching the 92% of car buyers who have not yet switched to EVs.

On Stocktwits, retail sentiment for Rivian was 'bearish' amid 'normal' message volume. Rivian's stock has risen 5% so far in 2025.

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