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| Image Credit: Rimac

Investindustrial, owner of Morgan Motor Company, has invested €120M in the maker of performance electric vehicles, Rimac. The Italian investment firm is joining Porsche, Hyundai, and Kia on the cap table and will help fuel Rimac’s high-performance electric vehicle technology.

While Tesla is the market leader in the electric vehicles space, legacy automakers and investors are looking for ways to jump on the electrification train as well. Having previously held stakes in Aston Martin and Ducati, Investindustrial is further expanding its investment in the Croatian EV company.

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Rimac gets support from Investindustrial for its EV platform

Electric Vehicles are no longer about Tesla alone. Legacy automakers like Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Porsche, Audi, Hyundai, Volkswagen, and others have already introduced electric vehicles. The likes of Maserati and Rolls Royce are set to launch their first EVs very soon. This transition from ICE-based automobiles to electrified vehicles is largely powered by disappearing range anxiety that limited adoption earlier.

Rimac, a Croatian automotive startup founded by Mate Rimac in 2009, wants to offer high-performance EVs to consumers. It is building EVs that want to be the equivalent of Bugatti in the ICE world. It has already produced two of the world’s fastest hypercars with batteries, Concept One and Nevera.

Now, to further expand its platform, Investindustrial is offering €120M in investment that will provide both capital and technical know-how. As the majority shareholder of iconic British sports car company Morgan Motor Company, Investindustrial deeply understands what makes sports cars truly an engineering feat in the automotive world.

For Rimac, which is yet to start delivering vehicles in numbers, this expertise could help set up the factory and start producing Nevera in volumes. Investindustrial made its first investment in Rimac in 2021 and is now expanding its stake as sales of EVs are expected to make up a third of the market by 2025 and surpass 50 per cent share by 2030.

“We are proud to support Rimac and its founder Mate Rimac, a visionary entrepreneur who in just 12 years has established Rimac as a benchmark in the sector, combining the past and future of the automotive industry. As Investindustrial we will put our skills and our international network at Rimac’s service. We want to be a solid, long-term partner in the implementation of the Group’s cutting-edge technologies, which are fundamental for pursuing the objective of further strengthening its leadership in the electric mobility sector,” says Andrea C. Bonomi, Chairman of Investindustrial’s Industrial Advisory Board.

Rimac: what you need to know

Founded in 2009, Rimac is a Croatian car manufacturer headquartered in Sveta Nedelja, Croatia. While it employs more than 1,300 people now, the company did not hire its first employee until 2011 when Adriano Mudri, a designer at General Motors, joined Mate’s effort to develop an electric supercar. Initially, they worked on a paper-exercise where Rimac built the technology and Mudri designed the car.

The company unveiled its first electric sports car named Concept One at the 2011 Frankfurt Motor Show and the production version called Concept S was introduced in 2016. The technology showcased by Rimac caught the attention of all the legacy automakers who were looking for ways to catch up with Tesla back then.

With Concept One and Concept S, Rimac had demonstrated to the world that the future of hypercars is not the petrol-powered ones with V12 engines but the ones with battery packs placed on their floors. This vision led Porsche to increase its ownership stake to 45 per cent and Volkswagen Group transferred its cult supercar brand Bugatti to Rimac.

Rimac Group now comprises Bugatti Rimac as the automotive company and Rimac Technology Business. This standalone technology entity will develop EV technology that will not only cater to Rimac but also act as a supplier to third-party manufacturers such as Aston Martin, Automobili Pininfarina, Hyundai, Kia, Koenigsegg, and Porsche.

Mate Rimac, Founder of Rimac, says, “Despite our evolution from garage to global over the last 10 years, we’re only in the early stages of our long-term vision for the Rimac Group. Next, we grow our family of hypercar models, we begin mass production of a number of major OEM electrification projects and we explore the next revolution in transport, all while building our new home in Croatia and rolling out the Nevera to customers all over the world. This latest collaboration with Investindustrial not only secures our future ambitions but allows us to tap into decades of global experience that will help accelerate our vision and deliver it with the kind of precision and innovation that the Rimac Group has become known for.”

With the likes of Ferrari, Lamborghini and other sports car makers entering the EV space, Rimac is finding the capital and industrial support it needs to build on its vision. It will be interesting to see whether it manages to sell more cars or becomes a technology provider.