Rivian May Be Much Closer to FSD Than You Think

[mpshizzle]

I go into way more depth in the video if you want to see my beautiful face:

With Rivian’s AI and Autonomy Day coming up on December 11th, they are making some seriously bold claims. RJ is basically betting the farm on autonomy because he thinks that in 5-10 years, a car that *can't* drive itself will be as appealing as a flip phone in 2024.

But are they actually close, or is this just expensive vaporware?

How are they moving so fast?
* Tesla has a massive head start, but Rivian has the glorious "second mover" advantage. Basically, they got to watch Tesla walk into the glass doors first so they didn't have to.
* Brain Power: They are building on Nvidia Orin chips that are specifically designed for AI. These chips simply didn’t exist when Tesla started their journey 84 years ago (or however long it's been). So they had to engineer their own to get the performance they wanted.
* HD Eyes: Rivian is using high-megapixel cameras and premium radar. It turns out that the "Garbage In, Garbage Out" rule applies to cars, too. Teaching a computer to drive is a lot easier and faster when it’s looking through 4K lenses instead of a potato. To be clear... I'm not saying Tesla uses Idaho spuds for cameras, I'm just saying having multiple kinds of high quality sensors can speed up the training process.

Is it actually working? Sure, the specs look good on paper, but can Rivian actually deliver? There are no guarantees, but I feel that it's looking pretty promising.
* The Gen 2 Glow-Up: If you’ve driven a Gen 2 recently, the switch from the old MobileEye system to Rivian’s internal stack is night and day.
* Hallucinations (The helpful kind): the driver's screen visualizations have started "hallucinating" lane lines on unmarked roads. Usually, hallucinations are bad, but here it seems the AI is actively inventing a safe path to drive on unmarked roads. This is a huge step toward universal Hands-Free.
* On the highway, the system seems to be reading the "body language" of other drivers—especially when making lane changes. It does an excellent job of predicting the movement of other drivers on neighboring lanes. This kind of predicitve behavior is HUGE when it comes to full autonomy

The Elephant in the Room: Subscriptions
We know a subscription is coming. Deep breaths.

While I hate monthly fees as much as anyone, I think this is different from BMW charging a subscription to warm your butt (*insert MASSIVE eye roll here*). This is an ongoing development cost. We aren't just unlocking hardware that's already there; we are funding the army of engineers teaching cars to drive over the next decade(s) of development.

I’m expecting them to drop the pricing details on December 11th.

What do you think? Does Rivian have a shot at the competing? Rivian is betting all their chips on this... Pun very much intended.

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[DuoRivians]

In the medium/long run it won’t matter. I think it’s a mistake car OEMs will be able to monetize driving assistance software.

If anything, level 4/5 driving will make car ownership obsolete for many people.

Waymo will likely soon provide a couple hundred dollars/mo subscription for 1,000 mile/mo of travel. That will cover the cost of energy, wear/tear, insurance, etc. And the more people who subscribe will make it cheaper for everyone.

Car OEMs like Rivian will have a tough sell if services like Waymo take off.

Waymo is now allowed to operate in greater Bay Area, LA, and San Diego.

 

[ndmiller]

I own a Tesla and FSD isn't and hasn't been Full Self Driving, it's a misnomer and shady marketing at best. This is not a benchmark Rivian should be shooting for, namely almost a decade of poorly performing promises on a $5-8K option or a $99/Month subscription.

If that's what December 11th is going to be, it's going to be hot garbage 2.0.

Now if you want to talk about automated driving and how Rivian is going to approach it, I'm in, but if you mention an FSD competitor, that's $$$ down the drain.

 

[Fmc]

Best case scenario I can send a car to pick up someone while I am at work..but what is a manufacturer’s motivation for me to own 1 car?

 

[nsuglerio]

I own a Tesla and FSD isn't and hasn't been Full Self Driving, it's a misnomer and shady marketing at best. This is not a benchmark Rivian should be shooting for, namely almost a decade of poorly performing promises on a $5-8K option or a $99/Month subscription.

If that's what December 11th is going to be, it's going to be hot garbage 2.0.

Now if you want to talk about automated driving and how Rivian is going to approach it, I'm in, but if you mention an FSD competitor, that's $$$ down the drain.

Then don't use it, problem solved.

For the record the FSD I have on my older Tesla was $2k at the time and it has been absolutely worth it. I don't even have the latest updates with my 2017 model and it still is very nice to have as an option.

I won't pontificate about timelines and whether it should be unsupervised or not but I welcome advancements in autonomy coming to Rivian as a plus. After getting back from a trip up the 395 where Rivians system never would turn on during a straight road for hours of driving, I think they can improve and I'm looking forward to whatever they have cooking.

 

[Magicbus]

The day I'm required to use or pay for FSD is the day I locate, purchase, and rehab my favorite vehicle ever... a 1996 Tahoe. Maybe I'll convert one to an EV.

I just like to drive.

 

[portdirect]

Will watch your video this evening @mpshizzle - looking forward to it

One thing that jumped out from your text though is high res cameras - I'm trying to get my hands on a AXM2.0 to strip down (for reasons… ) but as far as I’m currently aware the cameras used by gear guard and the 360 Birds Eye view are not plumbed into the Orin ‘complex’ (for want of a better term), but only the Ambarella CV5 - as a result we have no real idea of the resolution they actually operate at. In general though resolution helps, a bigger factor for vision systems is HDR/low light performance and frame rate.

As for the subscription-I hope they offer a lifetime purchase; I’d in general be more interested in that than a annual fee (unless they keep it below the annual rate of Connect+) - despite my troubles with our gen2 I almost got a launch edition quad for the bundled lifetime RAP+ and Connect+ included, but alas by the time Rivian had worked things out they had all gone…

 

[Time2Roll]

I don't see Rivian anything close to full self driving.

 

[captainjp]

I don't see Rivian anything close to full self driving.

That’s good ‘cause FSD sucks and is a Tesla gimmick

 

[mpshizzle]

Will watch your video this evening @mpshizzle - looking forward to it

One thing that jumped out from your text though is high res cameras - I'm trying to get my hands on a AXM2.0 to strip down (for reasons… ) but as far as I’m currently aware the cameras used by gear guard and the 360 Birds Eye view are not plumbed into the Orin ‘complex’ (for want of a better term), but only the Ambarella CV5 - as a result we have no real idea of the resolution they actually operate at. In general though resolution helps, a bigger factor for vision systems is HDR/low light performance and frame rate.

As for the subscription-I hope they offer a lifetime purchase; I’d in general be more interested in that than a annual fee (unless they keep it below the annual rate of Connect+) - despite my troubles with our gen2 I almost got a launch edition quad for the bundled lifetime RAP+ and Connect+ included, but alas by the time Rivian had worked things out they had all gone…

Oh interesting!!! I am very interested to hear what your findings are

 

[TexasBob]

Rivian is barking up the wrong tree IMO. Autonomy is coming and it is worth $1,500 lifetime (+/-). I drove 550 miles last week using Toyota's free POJ LKA and Adaptive Cruise and it was, on most dimensions superior to the Rivian Gen 1 or Gen 2 system (I have both).

We have moved to a time when any OEM can buy an NVIDIA Drive system and software and a bunch of them are. Rivian is dependent on older generation (and much, much slower) NVIDIA chips. The best think RJ can do on Autonomy Day is say, "we are a fast adopter of the NVIDIA AGX bundle and offering them on all our vehicles for $1,500 starting next year. The Gen 2 R1 vehicles with the significantly slower hardware can be upgraded for $2,500.

https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/drive-agx-developer-kit-general-availability/

 

[nsuglerio]

That’s good ‘cause FSD sucks and is a Tesla gimmick

Nah you have no idea what you're talking about. It works pretty damn well and for all practical purposes is used as a benchmark in ADAS videos for a reason.

Nothing wrong with disliking Tesla and FSD which I would understand.

 

[Cycliste]

That’s good ‘cause FSD sucks and is a Tesla gimmick

Full Self Delusion advocates have been (sold) Human Assisted Driving. I'm mainly disappointed in the name FSD

 

[riverie]

I am in my late 60's and have driven well over a million miles. I like the Enhanced Driver Assist on the highway better than I expected. The vehicle goes the speed I want, changes lanes when I want it to, and does (almost) nothing unexpected. It lessens the tedium of a long interstate drive. Fine.

In every other situation I will drive the vehicle regardless of self driving capability.

 

[DuoRivians]

Rivian is barking up the wrong tree IMO. Autonomy is coming and it is worth $1,500 lifetime (+/-). I drove 550 miles last week using Toyota's free POJ LKW and Adaptive Cruise and it was, on most dimensions superior to the Rivian Gen 1 or Gen 2 system (I have both).

We have moved to a time when any OEM can buy an NVIDIA Drive system and software and a bunch of them are. Rivian is dependent on older generation (and much, much slower) NVIDIA chips. The best think RJ can do on Autonomy Day is say, "we are a fast adopter of the NVIDIA AGX bundle and offering them on all our vehicles for $1,500 starting next year. The Gen 2 R1 vehicles with the significantly slower hardware can be upgraded for $2,500.

https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/drive-agx-developer-kit-general-availability/

I think $1500 is even too much. I’m debating if Level 3 it’s worth $150/yr. Perhaps if Rivian takes financial liability if the car gets in an accident under Level 3.

At $150/yr, $1500 lifetime implies a 10yr life of the car. I doubt I’ll have my Rivian for that long

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