Rivian ($PRIVATE:RIVIAN), an American electric vehicle maker, just partnered up with Ford ($F) after it received a nice $500 million check to help produce its luxury pickup truck and SUV by 2020. The company directly rivals Tesla ($TSLA), which is already looking past EV's and into fully-autonomous vehicles.
But for Rivian, it seems that its time in the sun may come sooner than an autopilot Musk-mobile.
On its official job listings website, Rivian increased the number of openings by 47.71% since February 14.
While most of these jobs are for a variety of tech, analysis, and safety positions, an analysis of job title keywords shows another potential sign of growth. Right around the beginning of March, Rivian ramped up hiring for jobs with the "recruitment" keyword.
That, of course, means only one thing: it's about ready to have a hiring boom.
Another big boom the company is having is, of course, within its URL Share count. The Thinknum database first started tracking Rivian when it closed an $800 million investing round led by Apple, which was reported on February 15. Now that Ford is throwing another half billion at the company, interest in what the company will sell seems to be increasing as well.
A quick Google Trends analysis shows that this funding boost isn't as big of a deal as that $800 million jackpot; yet we shouldn't judge it fully, as the week has yet to close for what should be an eventful time for the Tesla rival.