Rivian has reworked its loan deal with the Department of Energy and now expects to borrow $4.5 billion to build its novel factory in Georgia, down from the original amount of $6.6 billion allocated under the Biden administration.

The firm also published Thursday that it will draw on the loan sooner than planned, in early 2027, and expects to growth the total capacity of the Georgia plant from 200,000 to 300,000 vehicles in its initial phase of operation. The larger capacity — a 50% growth over its initial plans — will help lower its per unit costs, while also providing significant room for future expansion of capacity in later phases, the corporation remarked Thursday. 

Rivian has previously remarked the Georgia factory would have a total capacity of 400,000 vehicles. While the initial phase, which is tied to the DOE loan, has been increased, Rivian did not share what its plans are for the second phase. The original plan was for two 200,000-vehicle capacity phases. This also touches on aspects of startup.

During the earnings call, CFO Claire McDonough didn’t share what capacity that second phase would be, except to say that it was reserved for future expansion.

“The strategic decision that we took was to rise the initial phase of production capacity to the 300,000 units,” she remarked on the call. “On our Georgia site, the full initial capacity will be put on the upper pad at the site. So we have the lower pad, which is still going to be entirely untouched green field for future expansion.”

She noted the importance of this $4.5 billion funding was to allow Riven to scale its operation up to 515,000 units of overall capacity.

Some of the factory’s capacity will be used to produce R2 robotaxis for Uber. Under a deal struck earlier this year, Uber is making an initial $300 million investment in Rivian and is expected to purchase 10,000 fully autonomous R2 robotaxis ahead of a planned rollout in San Francisco and Miami in 2028. That initial $300 million payment is expected to close in the second quarter, and another $250 million investment is planned for later this year, according to Rivian.

The ride-hailing enterprise has the option to acquire up to 40,000 more autonomous R2 SUVs from Rivian starting in 2030. Uber will has remarked it will invest up to $1.25 billion in Rivian through 2031 if the automaker meets a series of milestones.

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Rivian broke ground on the Georgia factory late last year and is in the beginning stages of doing so-called vertical construction at the site located outside Atlanta. The enterprise expects to start making vehicles by the end of 2028. Until then, Rivian will build R2 SUVs at its current factory in Normal, Illinois.

The corporation recently started production of the R2 despite the plant suffering damage from a tornado, and Rivian commented Thursday it has made initial deliveries to employees. Deliveries to customers are expected to start “in the coming weeks, according to Rivian.

The modifications to the DOE loan come as Rivian revealed financial results for the first quarter of 2026 on Thursday. The business generated $1.38 billion in revenue, with $908 million coming from vehicle sales and $473 million from software and services. Rivian’s automotive revenue declined about 2% from the same year-ago period, due in part to drop in regulatory credits.

The firm lost $416 million in the quarter, down from a $541 million shortfall in the same period last year. That net debt shrank thanks, in part, to s $506 million gain in other income related to the Series A capital raise and related deconsolidation of CEO RJ Scaringe’s latest startup Mind Robotics, according to the firm.

Rivian saw its operating expenses and R&D costs grow year-over-year. Rivian’s R&D budget expanded 20% to $458 million as it increased spending on R2 pre-software and cloud services related to the development of autonomous vehicle innovation along with production costs.

The combination of these rising costs, plus a insignificant uptick in capital spending, was a drag on Rivian’s free cash flow, which is in negative territory. The firm reported a negative free cash flow of $1 billion, nearly double from a year ago.

This article has been updated with comments from Rivian’s CFO and previously stated capacity figures.

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