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Rivian vans are no longer an Amazon exclusive.<\/p>\n
The automaker said on Tuesday that it will now let other companies buy its commercial electric vans, ending an exclusivity deal that Amazon secured when it pumped more than a billion dollars into Rivian in 2019. <\/span>Both companies\u2019 stock prices rose following the announcement, which they timed with Rivian\u2019s third-quarter earnings report<\/a>.<\/p>\n Rivian was in talks with Amazon back in March to strip out their exclusivity clause ahead of time<\/a>. The original exclusivity arrangement was set to end after Rivian delivered a total of 100,000 electric vans, sometime before the end of the decade. Rivian said during its investor call that it still plans to come through on Amazon\u2019s goal.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been working on the exclusivity agreement with Amazon for a while,\u201d said Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe on Tuesday during an investor call. \u201cWith that, we\u2019ve been building relationships with a diverse set of commercial operators, and that\u2019s everything from last-mile to retail.\u201d<\/p>\n Amazon boasted in October that it had 10,000 Rivian-built vans on roads<\/a>, meeting a 2023 sales threshold set by the companies. That may sound like a whole lot of vans, and it is, but the retail giant\u2019s 10,000 van orders were reportedly \u201con the low end of a range Amazon had communicated earlier to the auto maker,\u201d The Wall Street Journal<\/a> wrote in March. Hence, the talks to call the exclusivity agreement early.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve always said that we want others to benefit from [Rivian\u2019s] technology in the long run because having more electric delivery vehicles on the road is good for our communities and our planet,\u201d said Amazon transportation boss Udit Madan in a prepared statement. Of course, whatever\u2019s good for Rivian is also good for Amazon; the retailer owns a 17% stake in the EV maker.<\/p>\n Amazon\u2019s total (owned and leased) fleet is enormous, spanning many tens of thousands of semi-trucks and vans<\/a> and around a hundred planes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n