EV maker Rivian to lay off 10% of staff to cut costs

Electric vehicle (EV) maker Rivian has announced to lay off approximately 10 per cent of its salaried workforce in a bid to cut costs. The company announced the latest job cuts in its 2023 fourth-quarter (Q4) earnings call. 

The Q4 financial report has shown that despite producing and delivering twice as many EVs in 2023 as compared to 2022, the company still incurred a loss of $5.4 billion for the year. Moreover, for the year 2024, Rivian anticipates producing approximately the same number of vehicles, i.e., around 57,000, as it did in 2023. "We are aggressively focused on driving cost efficiency throughout the business, achieving positive margins and building our go-to-market function to support our long-term growth," RJ Scaringe, Founder and CEO, Rivian said.

Rivian's total revenue for Q4 of 2023 was $1,315 million, driven by the delivery of 13,972 vehicles. For the year ended December 31, 2023, total revenue was $4,434 million, supported by 50,122 total vehicle deliveries.

It reported a net loss of $1.5 billion in Q4, a slight improvement over the $1.72 billion loss it reported in the same quarter of 2022. This is Rivian's third round of layoffs since July 2022, when it reduced its staff by 6 per cent. In February 2023, the EV maker reduced an additional 6 per cent of its workforce.