The Apple Car?
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Lucid, Rivian, Tesla vs GM and Ford
By Keith Teare • Issue #284 • View online
Rivian lost $580m last quarter but is valued at $124 billion. Ford’s 2021 revenue will be over $120 billion and it is worth only 60% of Rivian. Read on to see why it makes sense.
Contents
- Apple, Rivian, Lucid and Tesla vs Ford and GM
- 20% Interest? (thx to Loic Le Meur)
- Venture Capital — Wow!
- Web 3, Crypto and the Metaverse
- Startup of the Week
- Tweet of the Week
Editorial
Are we in a bubble? Or are we at the start of a revolution in the auto business? I start this week with a table and two charts. They show that Rivian (lost $580m last quarter) and Lucid (lost $520m last quarter) are worth more than GM ($102bn revenue — forward-looking 12 months and Ford ($140 bn revenue — forward-looking 12 months). Tesla ($52 bn in forward-looking 12-month revenue) is valued at over $1 trillion. As a multiple of revenue, Tesla gets 20 x; Ford only 0.6 x and GM 0.9x.
On the face of it, this makes no sense. However, when growth is factored in, Ford and GM are both declining and Tesla is growing annually at 30%. Lucid and Rivian have infinite growth because they are starting with zero revenue. Lucis has 17,000 pre-orders of a fabulous car with an average price of around $140,000, so about $2.4 bn of revenue and great profit margins. Rivian has pre-orders from Amazon for about 50,000 vehicles with an average price of $75,000, so about $3.75 bn. If we use those numbers as a basis then Rivian’s $124 bn market cap is 33 x its sales expectation based on current pre-orders and Lucid’s $72 bn market cap is 30 x its pre-order value.
Rivian and Lucid will have far higher annual growth than Tesla and so the higher multiple is justified.
