Volkswagen just became Rivian’s biggest investor. It is not buying trucks. It is buying the software its own engineers could not build.

TL;DR

Volkswagen has overtaken Amazon as Rivian’s largest shareholder after a one billion dollar share purchase triggered by a software joint venture milestone. VW now holds 15.9 per cent of Rivian, while Amazon’s stake has diluted from 20 per cent to 11.8 per cent without selling a share. The investment reflects VW’s failed internal software division and its dependence on Rivian’s zonal architecture for its next-generation vehicles.

When Rivian went public in November 2021, Amazon owned 20 per cent of the company. It had backed the electric vehicle startup with a 700 million dollar cheque in 2019, ordered 100,000 electric delivery vans, and watched its investment surge to more than 15 billion dollars on Rivian’s first day of trading. Four years later, Amazon has not sold a single share. Its stake has still fallen to 11.8 per cent, diluted by the successive capital raises that have kept Rivian alive while...

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