Rivian, a new force in automobile manufacturing in the United States, recently announced its financial results in the second quarter. The net loss of this new electric car rookie, known as "Tesla killer", has increased from US $580 million in the same period a year ago to US $1.71 billion, three times that of the second quarter of 2021.

At the same time, rivian also warned that the company expected an annual net loss of $5.45 billion, higher than the previous estimate of $4.75 billion. Rivian attributed this to the rising cost of raw materials and transportation caused by inflation, as well as the cost pressure caused by increased investment in production expansion.

According to the financial report data of the second quarter, the cumulative revenue of rivian in the past 4-6 months was 364 million US dollars, higher than the previous market expectation of 335 million US dollars. As of the end of June this year, the company's cash and equivalent balance was $15.5 billion, far lower than the previous quarter's $17 billion.

According to official statistics of rivian, the company's vehicle delivery in the second quarter has increased from 1227 in the first quarter to 4467, and the number of new assembled vehicles has also increased from 2553 in the first quarter to 4401.

The California based car manufacturing start-up said that it has received 98000 orders for r1t pickup trucks and R1s SUVs, and has accepted up to 100000 electric delivery vehicles from Amazon. It is reported that Amazon has received the first batch of rivian electric pickups in July, and new cars will be delivered in succession.

At the time of high inflation and weak consumption in North America, cost reduction and efficiency improvement have also become the main theme of rivian. According to Reuters, the company has postponed some plans to 2023.

Through a series of cost reduction measures, rivian's capital expenditure in the second quarter has decreased from US $431 million in the same period of last year to US $359 million. The company said on Thursday that R1 series of high-end pickup trucks and SUVs are unlikely to benefit from the new energy and climate bill recently passed by the US Senate.

However, rivian is eligible for a subsidy of up to $40000 per vehicle, which is applicable to large electric commercial trucks supplied to Amazon.

At present, the spokesman of rivian is still full of confidence in the company's cash flow. According to the current capital reserve, the company is enough to pay for the investment of US $5 billion in the second US assembly plant outside Atlanta.

At the second quarter financial report release, the company reiterated its forecast of 25000 vehicles this year and emphasized the package of cost reduction measures to be implemented in the second half of the year. A rivian spokesman said that the company's Illinois plant can produce 150000 vehicles per year and has sufficient confidence in the established production plan.

Just last month, rivan announced a 6% layoff. Before announcing the layoff, the company had about 14000 employees worldwide.

People familiar with the situation have told Reuters that rivian will focus on non manufacturing jobs in this round of layoffs, including teams with high degree of duplication of functions and easy to be replaced. The dismissed employees will receive formal notice of dismissal in the next few weeks.

The spokesman disclosed that as part of the cost reduction, rivian's layoff was prudent and thoughtful. At present, the company is in the critical stage of rapid capacity ramp up. When the first quarter financial report was released, rivian still held cash of $16 billion.

However, in the view of Wall Street analysts, although rivian's current cash flow pressure is small, with the acceleration of competition among American competitors such as Ford, Tesla and general motors, the company may face greater cash flow pressure around 2025, which is earlier than that predicted by North American analysts.

Bloomberg has previously predicted that rivian is likely to burn up about $19 billion by 2024, and it is difficult for shareholders Amazon and Ford to continuously increase their huge capital.

It is worth mentioning that Amazon and Ford, the main investors of rivian, have recorded Book losses of billions of dollars in this year's financial statements, and these losses are directly related to rivian.

The financial report of the second quarter also shows that rivian still has a long way to go before fulfilling its profit and capacity commitments, and the delivery of new cars is only the first step of the long march. The company still needs to produce 18000 vehicles in the next eight months to achieve the production target of 25000 vehicles this year, that is, about 9000 vehicles per quarter.

For rivian, this is not a small task...