What is servicing a Rivian vehicle like today and what might it look like five years from now?
Noe: Today we have a great blend of mobile service and Service Centers to serve our customers. We have a great foundation of remote diagnostic capabilities and mobile app service functionality. Five years from now, our mobile service and Service Center fleet will be much closer to our customers in all areas. Even more repairs and issues will be addressed remotely and with mobile service, reducing the need to come into a Service Center unless the customer prefers to do so. Our mobile app will also have a host of customer-friendly capabilities such as self-scheduling and advanced issue capture and reporting.
How are we growing Service this year?
Noe: The service team, mobile service fleet, and Service Center footprint are planned to more than double in capacity this year, as we enter new markets and enable higher volume support to our customers.
As the industry goes electric, how is Rivian ensuring the service team has the right skills?
Noe: We hire top technicians and put them through extensive in-house training programs. This makes sure that the highly skilled workforce we hired achieves proficiency in complex high voltage and Rivian-specific diagnostics and repair. We consider training to be an ongoing part of employee development. Once our technicians establish a Rivian technical product knowledge & high voltage foundation, we continuously update their skills through training on the latest tech, tooling, operating systems, procedures, and diagnostic techniques. In parallel, we are also developing apprenticeship programs and trade school partnership to ensure we have a long-term pipeline of high potential employees to fulfill the future needs of our service team.