That sounds like complete nonsense. To develop a car like the Rivian from scratch will cost about one billion dollars, maybe 1.5. All the rest of the rumored 10 billion dollars hence will have been been spent on the software development, which apparently still failed.
Buying Rivian would give Apple nothing that could solve their evident problems with the project.
Literally everything you wrote in support of Fisker also holds for Rivian. Although I think it very unlikely that Apple will buy any car company, Rivian would be a better fit for Apple for one simple reason: they have indicated, many times, they like to control/make all the critical components of of their products. Fisker doesn't even make their own cars - they're produced by Magna-Steyr in Austria! Rivian makes its own cars and has developed its own related technologies (e.g. the motors that now drive most of their newer vehicles).
But Munster is not the smartest tool in the shed. He just throws stuff onto a wall and hopes something sticks. He previously forecast Apple will produce a TV for christ sake.
If anything, Apple pairing up with a platform like Magna through an investment or partnership is the best play. I believe that EVs will become a very fractured market, much more so than ICE cars, because you can just build an experience atop a platform. Buy the battery, drivetrain, framework from a Magna, then you add the experience. We are already seeing tech companies announcing cars. The platform builders would offer a flexible array of options so that you can build a sports car, laid-back SUV, or small urban putter. It'll make for way more reliable cars, unlike so many of today's cars where they look great, but you need to be ready to for lots of garage time (most British and Italian cars?). Just look at the Supra vs. the Z4. Built on the same platform, share most of their DNA, but each manufacturer made it into something unique with design and execution tweaks.
Apple needs to get in on the platform business to get CarPlay and core electronics into these cars.
Look at all the car companies struggling right now. Not a smart market to jump into where Apple has no track record or experience. Building tech to put into vehicles makes way more sense. Building vehicles is just a disaster in the making. Smart move cancelling their project — reap any tech they can from it and use it to build other things or license it to other car makers.
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Buying Rivian would give Apple nothing that could solve their evident problems with the project.
Apple needs to get in on the platform business to get CarPlay and core electronics into these cars.