LEGACY LEADERSHIP: RJ Scaringe founded Rivian Automotive shortly after graduating from MIT in 2009. Decided to develop adventure-ready electric trucks and SUVs believing that the industry will eventually transition to fully electric vehicles in the future. Has gained votes of confidence from major companies such as Amazon, Volkswagen Group and Uber.
HQ: Irvine
OC SIGNIFICANCE: Rivian has grown into OC’s largest automaker, ranked by local headcount, with about 1,800 employees in the region despite incurring at least four rounds of layoffs over the past two years. Its vehicle engineering and design operations are in Irvine, and its flagship retail showroom is in Laguna Beach, where in 2024, CEO RJ Scaringe took the stage to announce the next EVs in the automaker’s lineup, the R2 and R3.
DEFINING MOMENT: Rivian went public in 2021 in the largest IPO of the year, raising nearly $12B (Nasdaq: RIVN). The company’s market cap soon exceeded $120B as it delivered its first R1 vehicles.
BY THE NUMBERS: As of June, Rivian is OC’s fourth most valuable publicly traded company with $22B market cap. In 2025, sales reached $5.4B and it delivered 42,247 electric vehicles. With this year’s launch of its R2 vehicle, Rivian predicts 2026 deliveries will rise to between 62,000 and 67,000, representing a 47% to 59% increase. Recent investments include $1.25B from Uber and $5.8B from Volkswagen.
QUOTABLE: “I’ve said this many times: I’ve never been as confident as I am today about what our trajectory looks like.” — Scaringe told the Business Journal in 2025
FUN FACT: One of Rivian’s recent EV commercials features RJ Scaringe’s 9-year-old son, Pete, driving a red go-kart—a nod to a childhood photo of the founder behind the wheel of a similar kart.
