The robotic swerved by the cafeteria of Rivian’s Palo Alto workplace, cabinets adorned with chilled canned coffees — till it didn’t. 5 minutes later, a person fastidiously pushed it out of everybody’s manner, the phrases “I’m caught” flashing yellow on the poor droid’s display screen.
It was an inauspicious begin to Rivian’s “Autonomy & AI Day,” a showcase for the corporate’s plans to make its autos able to driving themselves. Rivian doesn’t make the cafeteria robotic and isn’t chargeable for its skills, however there was a well-known message in its foibles: these items is difficult.
Hours later, as I rode in a 2025 R1S SUV throughout my 15-minute demo of Rivian’s new self-described “Giant Driving Mannequin,” I used to be reminded of that message.
The EV outfitted with the automated-driving software program drove myself and two Rivian workers on a switchback route close to the corporate’s campus. As we glided previous Tesla’s engineering workplace, I seen a Mannequin S in entrance of us gradual to show into the rival firm’s lot. The R1S ultimately seen this, too, braking laborious simply earlier than the Rivian worker practically intervened.
Throughout my demo drive, there was one precise disengagement. The worker within the driver’s seat took over as we handed by a one-lane part of street as a result of some tree-trimming. Minor stuff general. Nevertheless it wasn’t precisely uncommon both; I noticed a number of different demo rides that had disengagements, too.
The remainder of the drive went nicely sufficient for software program that’s not able to be shipped, particularly when you think about that Rivian threw out its outdated rules-based driver help system and adopted an end-to-end method — which is how Tesla developed Full Self-Driving (Supervised). It stopped at stoplights, it dealt with turns, it slowed for velocity bumps, all with out programmed guidelines telling it to do this stuff.
A quiet pivot in 2021
Rivian’s outdated system “was all very deterministic, and it was all very structured,” CEO RJ Scaringe mentioned in an interview Thursday. “Every little thing that the automobile did was the results of a prescribed management technique written by people.”
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Scaringe mentioned that when Rivian noticed transformer-based synthetic intelligence taking off in 2021, he quietly “reconstituted the crew and began with a clear sheet and mentioned, let’s design our self-driving platform for an AI-centric world.”
After spending “plenty of time within the basement,” Rivian launched the brand new ground-up driving software program in 2024 on its second-generation R1 autos, which use Nvidia’s Orin processors.
Scaringe mentioned it was solely just lately that his firm began to see dramatic progress “as soon as the information began actually pouring in.”
Rivian is betting it may well practice its Giant Driving Mannequin (LDM) on fleet knowledge so rapidly that it’ll permit the corporate to roll out what it calls “Common Fingers-Free” later this month. Meaning Rivian house owners will be capable to take their palms off the wheel on 3.5 million miles of roads within the U.S. and Canada (as long as there are seen painted strains). Within the again half of 2026, Rivian will permit “point-to-point” driving, or the buyer model of the demo we acquired Thursday.
The ‘eyes off’ to ‘palms off’ problem
By the top of 2026, after Rivian has began transport its smaller, extra inexpensive R2 SUVs, it’ll ditch the Nvidia chips and outfit these autos with a brand new customized autonomy pc unveiled Thursday. That pc, plus a lidar sensor, will ultimately permit drivers to take their palms and eyes off the street. True autonomy — the place a driver doesn’t have to fret about re-taking management of the automobile — lies nicely past that and can largely rely on how briskly Rivian can practice its LDM.
This rollout introduces a near-term problem for Rivian. The brand new autonomy pc and lidar received’t be prepared till months after the R2 goes on sale. If clients desire a automobile that may deal with eyes-off driving (or extra), they’ll have to attend. However the R2 is an important product for Rivian, and the corporate wants it to promote nicely — particularly within the wake of declining gross sales of its first-generation autos.
“When tech is transferring as quick as it’s, there’s at all times going to be some degree of obsolescence, and so what we wish to do right here is to be actually direct” about what’s coming, Scaringe mentioned. The early R2s will nonetheless get Rivian’s promised “point-to-point” driving, which can be primarily based on the brand new software program and can be hands-off however not eyes-off.
“So [if] you’re shopping for an R2 and you purchase it within the first 9 months, it’s simply going to be extra constrained,” he mentioned. “I feel what’s going to occur is a few clients will say ‘that issues loads to me, and I’m going to attend.’ And a few will say ‘I would like the latest, greatest issues now, and I’m going to get the R2 now, and possibly I’ll commerce it in a yr or two, and I’ll get the following model later. Luckily, there’s a lot demand backlog for R2 that we expect, by being upfront with this, clients could make the choice themselves.”
“In an ideal world, every little thing instances on the similar time, however the timeline of the automobile and the timeline of the autonomy platform are simply not completely aligned,” he mentioned.
Once I first interviewed Scaringe in 2018, earlier than Rivian even confirmed what its autos regarded like, he shared a aim that also rattles round my head. He needed to make Rivian’s autos so able to driving themselves that: “in the event you go for a hike, and also you begin at one level and also you end at one other level, you have got the automobile meet you on the finish of the path.”
It was the form of pie-in-the-sky promise about self-driving automobiles that was all the craze seven years in the past, but it surely caught with me at the very least as a result of it was one thing that felt true to Rivian’s complete model of aspirational journey.
Scaringe instructed me Thursday he nonetheless thinks it’s attainable for Rivian to allow a use case like that within the subsequent few years. It actually received’t occur till the corporate exams and builds its more-capable R2 autos, which is at the very least a yr away in a best-case state of affairs.
“We might [do that]. It’s not been an enormous focus,” he mentioned. That might change as the corporate will get nearer to degree 4 autonomy, although, since by then the corporate could have its LDM educated on trickier roads with out guiding options like lane strains.
“Then, it turns into a little bit of a like, what’s the ODD [operational design domain]? Filth roads, off street? Straightforward,” he mentioned. Simply don’t count on a Rivian driving itself up Hell’s Gate in Moab.
“We’re not placing any assets into rock crawling autonomously,” he mentioned. “However by way of attending to the path head? For certain.”
This story has been up to date to replicate that Rivian’s Common Fingers-Free replace is coming later this month.
