And what about its first?

By Gary S. Vasilash

Word is that Rivian, the company that will be producing an electric pickup—the R1T—and an SUV—the R1S—at its factory in Normal, Illinois (quite a name for a burg, if there ever was one), where it is also producing commercial vehicles for Amazon, which is one of its investors (as are Ford, Cox Automotive and others), is looking for a plot of land upon which to build a second factory with a 200,000-vehicle per year capacity.

Seems like the company has big aspirations.

And on the subject of big, it also seems that Texas has the inside track on the factory.

But here’s the thing: the 2.6-million square foot factory in Normal has capacity of over 200,000 vehicles.

You’d think, perhaps, that they would want to make sure that (1) they have all of the bugs worked out of the processes and (2) that they would have sufficient demand for their vehicles before looking to spend a rumored $5-billion on a second factory.

Of course, factories don’t go up overnight.

That said: Might this not be a bit premature?