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Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

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Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Musk has been exceptional at figuring out markets to drive a tech up the experience curve that aren’t his ultimately desired market. Often it takes multiple companies to do that.

Maybe five years ago I observed that Nissan and Tesla were homing in on the same market from opposite directions. Tesla built the Roadster which is a toy. Then the Luxo Model X and S Sedans followed by the affordable Model 3. Nissan built the affordable but limited range Leaf and just kept increasing the range every other year or so. They basically started each with one type of suck (Tesla=Price, Nissan=Range) and wo…

I never realized that before, but you're right.

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#182
post #103

Honestly this is a good move, I just have a quick question: Does anyone anywhere have video footage of a Rivian actually being driven? Like, not in a commercial, someone genuinely driving it. I just want to know if they are anywhere close to having a production vehicle. If they have a single production vehicle that does what they say, then OK they "just" have to figure out scaling up the manufacturing. If they don't…

> If they don't have a single vehicle, they are years and years away, to the point that Tesla truck may beat them to mass market.

StreetScooter, a DHL subsidiary, managed to ramp up the production of electric delivery trucks much quicker. They also sell to third-parties (mostly in Germany I suppose).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/StreetScooter

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#183
"The company will be ordering 100,000 electric delivery trucks"

Headline is false. Amazon have NOT ordered 100k electric delivery trucks. Amazon have made a announcement to get a lot of free press. For themselves (vitue signalling, oooh isn't amazon green) and for the company in which they have invested.

Seriously. I'm announcing here that I will order bezos' underpants. You should take it as seriously. Corporate PR is and this is another weak edition of it from Amazon.

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#184
post #158

And remember when Uber “ordered” 100,000 Mercedes S-Classes? https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/news/a28508/uber-or... Bezos is probably trying to pressure UPS (or has some other business motive) versus target Amazon’s carbon footprint. Amazon will undoubtably grow its own delivery fleet over time, but this splashy press release is probably not entirely about climate change.

Climate change? I thought it was about Bezos taking a snipe at Tesla because SpaceX is way ahead of Blue Origin.

Human will be saved my the egos of 2 billionaires

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fellow Normalite here, you still in the area? Would love to talk shop with a local Hacker Newser. Email in my profile if you're interested.

Wow, I would not have expected to find so many Normalites here.

Spent 7 years in Urbana-Champaign. 45 minutes from Normal. There is huuuge potential in that area.

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#187
post #183

"The company will be ordering 100,000 electric delivery trucks" Headline is false. Amazon have NOT ordered 100k electric delivery trucks. Amazon have made a announcement to get a lot of free press. For themselves (vitue signalling, oooh isn't amazon green) and for the company in which they have invested. Seriously. I'm announcing here that I will order bezos' underpants. You should take it as seriously. Corporate PR…

In case that wasn't clear. The order has NOT been made. Perhaps a good story, that is more than just corporate PR would be one that matches the headline. Where the announcement is that they have made the order and the terms. (Cancellable at any time for any reason - yeah not that). That way it would be a story with substance not simply a corporate PR announcement, which this clearly is, whether we wish it were more or not.

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#188
post #183

"The company will be ordering 100,000 electric delivery trucks" Headline is false. Amazon have NOT ordered 100k electric delivery trucks. Amazon have made a announcement to get a lot of free press. For themselves (vitue signalling, oooh isn't amazon green) and for the company in which they have invested. Seriously. I'm announcing here that I will order bezos' underpants. You should take it as seriously. Corporate PR…

This article as well as others are a bit thin on that particular detail, with some saying "will be ordering" and others speaking of Rivian "receiving an order" or "a deal being announced".

But, in any case: do you actually have doubts that this is real? I can see scepticism regarding the timetable and targeted number of vehicles. But for Amazon to just nope away now would be catastrophic for their $750 million investment in Rivian, and their general image. It would destroy far more than whatever this announcement may get in terms of good PR.

And isn't investing $750 million into such a company enough "skin in the game" to make accusations of "virtue signalling" nonsensical, even by that cheap insult's own definition?

Re: Amazon orders 100K electric delivery trucks from Rivian

#190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EV acceleration is directly proportional to how much current you can pull out of the battery pack, which is directly proportional to the number of battery cells, which is directly proportional to overall range... On paper, yes those numbers are feasible.

Wrong. Acceleration is driven by voltage, current dictates top speed.

If anything, it's the opposite; for a given motor winding, more voltage will increase the top speed, and high-load draws more current. That's why electric motors can burn out if you stall them.

The reality is more complicated when you can vary the motor design, Kv, etc.

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