The electric vehicle company Rivian is known for products that are, well, large: pickup trucks, SUVs, and delivery vans. But for the past three years, it has been stealthily designing the technology platform for a slew of much smaller, yet-to-be-revealed electric vehicles — think bikes, scooters, and golf carts. Today, Rivian officially spun off that project into its own company, called Also, while … also … announcing that the new venture had raised a $105 million Series B funding round.
The name Also, the company’s CEO Chris Yu told me, points to the idea that owning a car and owning a smaller EV are not mutually exclusive — rather, it’s about finding the right tool for the job. “If I’m taking my family to Yosemite on the weekend, I want to use my Rivian R1S, but for my daily school runs, probably not. That’s not the most efficient or enjoyable way to do it,” Yu told me. In the U.S. about 80% of all car trips are 15 miles or less, and over 50% of are less than six miles. The goal of Also, Yu said, is for smaller EV’s — or “micromobility solutions” — to replace cars for those shorter daily excursions.
Prior to his new role, Yu worked as vice president on Rivian’s “Future Programs” team, working to incubate Also alongside Rivian’s CEO RJ Scaringe, who will now serve as the new company’s board chair while continuing to lead Rivian. The incumbent EV-automaker participated in Also’s Series B alongside the lead investor, venture capital firm Eclipse, and will maintain a minority ownership stake in it.
Also’s flagship product is set to launch in the U.S. and Europe early next year, and will be followed by consumer and commercial products for the Asian and South American markets, though the company hasn’t yet said what these products will be. In the U.S., electric scooters and e-bikes have taken off in cities, while in some suburban areas, beach towns and retirement communities, golf carts are ubiquitous. Across much of South Asia, Africa, and Latin America, three-wheelers such as rickshaws and mototaxis are everywhere, and are increasingly being electrified.
But there’s still a long way to go. “The rate of electrification for small vehicles across the world is far, far lower than cars, like low single digit percent,” Yu told me. He said that what will set Also apart from existing offerings — besides electrification, of course — is the scale the company aims to operate at and its intuitive technology platform.
Also is developing everything in-house, from the motors to the software, which Yu said will lead to the type of seamless, personalized user experiences that customers have come to expect from newer EVs such as Rivians or Teslas. Think “walking up to your vehicle and having it automatically know that it’s you and unlocking,” Yu told me, or “adjusting to your profiles, your media plays, what you were last playing, etc.” Making something like an e-bike or electric golf cart “smarter,” Yu explained, could also help with issues such as security — potentially making Also’s TBD products less vulnerable to theft — or safety, such as gauging if someone is riding at a dangerous speed for the area or in an inappropriate zone.
Even with this type of advanced technology integration, Yu claimed that the company’s products will be cost competitive with what’s on the market today due to the scale that Also aims to achieve. Yu’s hope is that taking advantage of Rivian’s existing technologies and retail footprint will help.
Whatever form factor Also’s small EVs take, Yu told me they will embody Rivian’s adventurous spirit, “weaving in some of what people aspire to do and look forward to doing, whether it’s on a weekend or summer vacations,” he explained. So will this look like an off-roading golf cart? A smarter electric mountain bike? A scooter that also rips on the backroads? We’ll have to wait until next year to see.
