Riding Onboard With Rivian’s Race To Autonomy

The robot swerved done nan cafeteria of Rivian’s Palo Alto office, shelves adorned pinch chilled canned coffees — until it didn’t. Five minutes later, a man cautiously pushed it retired of everyone’s way, nan words “I’m stuck” flashing yellowish connected nan mediocre droid’s screen.

It was an inauspicious commencement to Rivian’s “Autonomy & AI Day,” a showcase for nan company’s plans to make its vehicles tin of driving themselves. Rivian doesn’t make nan cafeteria robot and isn’t responsible for its abilities, but location was a acquainted connection successful its foibles: this worldly is hard.

Hours later, arsenic I rode successful a 2025 R1S SUV during my 15-minute demo of Rivian’s caller self-described “Large Driving Model,” I was reminded of that message.

The EV equipped pinch nan automated-driving package drove myself and 2 Rivian labor connected a switchback way adjacent nan company’s campus. As we glided past Tesla’s engineering office, I noticed a Model S successful beforehand of america slow to move into nan rival company’s lot. The R1S yet noticed this, too, braking difficult conscionable earlier nan Rivian worker astir intervened.

During my demo drive, location was 1 existent disengagement. The worker successful nan driver’s spot took complete arsenic we passed done a one-lane conception of roadworthy owed to immoderate tree-trimming. Minor worldly overall. But it wasn’t not precisely uncommon either; I spotted aggregate other demo rides that had disengagements too.

The remainder of nan thrust went good capable for package that is not fresh to beryllium shipped, particularly erstwhile you see that Rivian threw retired its aged rules-based driver assistance strategy and adopted an end-to-end attack — which is really Tesla developed Full Self-Driving (Supervised). It stopped astatine stoplights, it handled turns, it slowed for velocity bumps, each without programmed rules telling it to do these things.

A quiet pivot successful 2021

Image Credits:Rivian

Rivian’s aged strategy “was each very deterministic, and it was each very structured,” CEO RJ Scaringe said successful an question and reply Thursday. “Everything that nan conveyance did was nan consequence of a prescribed power strategy written by humans.”

Scaringe said that erstwhile Rivian saw transformer-based artificial intelligence taking disconnected successful 2021, he softly “reconstituted nan squad and started pinch a cleanable expanse and said, let’s creation our self-driving level for an AI-centric world.”

After spending “a batch of clip successful nan basement,” Rivian launched nan caller ground-up driving package successful 2024 connected its second-generation R1 vehicles, which usage Nvidia’s Orin processors.

Scaringe said it was only precocious that his institution started to spot melodramatic advancement “once nan information started really pouring in.”

Rivian is betting it tin train its Large Driving Model (LDM) connected fleet information truthful quickly that it will let nan institution to rotation retired what it calls “Universal Hands-Free” driving successful early 2026. That intends Rivian owners will beryllium capable to return their hands disconnected nan instrumentality connected 3.5 cardinal miles of roads successful nan U.S. and Canada (so agelong arsenic location are visible painted lines). In nan backmost half of 2026 Rivian will let “point-to-point” driving, aliases nan user type of nan demo we received Thursday.

The ‘eyes off’ to ‘hands off’ challenge

By nan extremity of 2026, aft Rivian has started shipping its smaller, much affordable R2 SUVs, it will ditch nan Nvidia chips and outfit those vehicles pinch a caller civilization autonomy machine unveiled Thursday. That computer, positive a lidar sensor, will yet let drivers to return their hands and eyes disconnected nan road. True autonomy — wherever a driver doesn’t person to interest astir re-taking power of nan conveyance — lies good beyond that and will mostly dangle connected really accelerated Rivian tin train its LDM.

This rollout introduces a near-term situation for Rivian. The caller autonomy machine and lidar won’t beryllium fresh until months aft nan R2 goes connected sale. If customers want a conveyance that tin grip eyes-off driving (or more), they’ll person to wait. But nan R2 is simply a important merchandise for Rivian, and nan institution needs it to waste good — particularly successful nan aftermath of declining income of its first-generation vehicles.

“When tech is moving arsenic accelerated arsenic it is, there’s ever going to beryllium immoderate level of obsolescence, and truthful what we want to do present is to beryllium really direct” astir what’s coming, Scaringe said. The early R2s will still get Rivian’s promised “point-to-point” driving, which will beryllium based connected nan caller package and will beryllium hands-off but not eyes-off.

“So [if] you’re buying an R2 and you bargain it successful nan first 9 months, it’s conscionable going to beryllium much constrained,” he said. “I deliberation what will hap is immoderate customers will opportunity ‘that matters a batch to me, and I’m going to wait.’ And immoderate will opportunity ‘I want nan newest, champion things now, and I’m going to get nan R2 now, and possibly I’ll waste and acquisition it successful a twelvemonth aliases two, and I’ll get nan adjacent type later. Fortunately, there’s truthful overmuch request backlog for R2 that we think, by being upfront pinch this, customers tin make nan determination themselves.”

“In a cleanable world, everything times astatine nan aforesaid time, but nan timeline of nan conveyance and nan timeline of nan autonomy level are conscionable not perfectly aligned,” he said.

When I first interviewed Scaringe successful 2018, earlier Rivian moreover showed what its vehicles looked like, he shared a extremity that still rattles astir my head. He wanted to make Rivian’s vehicles truthful tin of driving themselves that: “if you spell for a hike, and you commencement astatine 1 constituent and you decorativeness astatine different point, you person nan conveyance meet you astatine nan extremity of nan trail.”

It was nan benignant of pie-in-the-sky committedness astir self-driving cars that was each nan rage 7 years ago, but it stuck pinch maine astatine slightest because it was thing that felt existent to Rivian’s full marque of aspirational adventure.

Scaringe told maine Thursday he still thinks it’s imaginable for Rivian to alteration a usage lawsuit for illustration that successful nan adjacent fewer years. It surely won’t hap until nan institution tests and builds its more-capable R2 vehicles, which is astatine slightest a twelvemonth distant successful a best-case scenario.

“We could [do that]. It’s not been a immense focus,” he said. That could alteration arsenic nan institution gets person to level 4 autonomy, though, since by past nan institution will person its LDM trained connected trickier roads without guiding features for illustration lane lines.

“Then, it becomes a spot of a like, what’s nan ODD [operational creation domain]? Dirt roads, disconnected road? Easy,” he said. Just don’t expect a Rivian driving itself up Hell’s Gate successful Moab.

“We’re not putting immoderate resources into stone crawling autonomously,” he said. “But successful position of getting to nan way head? For sure.”