Rivian Automotive Inc., the electric-vehicle maker backed by Amazon.com Inc., is scouting places in Europe to construct a brand new manufacturing unit, folks accustomed to the matter informed Bloomberg.

The location probably would first produce a supply van for Amazon and shortly after construct Rivian’s fashions for shoppers, the folks mentioned. Whereas no website has been chosen but, a number of international locations are into consideration, together with the U.Ok., Germany and Hungary, mentioned the folks, who requested to not be named discussing personal info. Different websites exterior the European Union are also into consideration.

Rivian has employed the business actual property providers agency JLL for the search. The carmaker hopes to begin van manufacturing as quickly as subsequent 12 months, a number of the folks mentioned.

Representatives for Rivian, Amazon and JLL declined to remark.

Rivian is seen as a possible automotive disruptor akin to Tesla Inc., the world’s largest maker of purely battery-powered autos.

The Irvine, California-based firm is because of begin manufacturing and U.S. deliveries of a pickup mannequin in June, adopted by an SUV in August. Bloomberg Information reported Tuesday that it’s seeking to go public as quickly as September, probably at a valuation of greater than $50 billion.

Rivian has an order for 100,000 electrical supply vans from Amazon, which has invested within the firm. Amazon has mentioned it expects 10,000 of the vans to be on roads making deliveries globally by 2022, and the remainder of the order is due by the top of the last decade. Manufacturing of the vans is predicted to begin at Rivian’s plant in Regular, Sick., by the fourth quarter.

EVs are a cornerstone of Amazon’s objective to ship half its shipments with out producing greenhouse gasoline emissions by 2030. It has purchased tens of hundreds of conventionally fueled vans in recent times and is more and more delivering packages utilizing bespoke contractors in Amazon-branded autos as an alternative of counting on companions similar to United Parcel Service Inc.

Three variants of the Rivian-built van are deliberate with completely different cab shapes and sizes tailor-made to various kinds of cargo. The vans might be able to driving round 150 miles between prices.

Rivian has raised greater than $8 billion so far from high-profile firms and traders together with Amazon, Ford Motor Co., T. Rowe Value and BlackRock. The carmaker was valued at $27.6 billion in its newest spherical, an individual accustomed to the matter mentioned final month. It has greater than 3,600 workers throughout websites in Michigan, California and the plant in Illinois, which was previously owned by Mitsubishi Motors Corp.

The startup was based in 2009 by R.J. Scaringe, a Massachusetts Institute of Know-how graduate with a doctorate in mechanical engineering who’s CEO.