Rivian Picks Outsider as COO to Troubleshoot Production Snags

(Bloomberg) — Electrical pickup maker Rivian Automotive Inc. has hired a best executive from a big vehicle pieces supplier as its up coming main operating officer, in accordance to individuals familiar with the make a difference, an effort to get its troubled manufacturing operations again on keep track of.

Rivian has struggled to ramp up creation, citing provide chain constraints these kinds of as a shortage of semiconductors. To aid deal with all those generation snags, it has decided on Frank Klein, the head of a auto-generating unit at Canada’s Magna Intercontinental Inc., claimed the individuals, who declined to be named. 

A consultant for Irvine, California-centered Rivian declined to comment.

Chief Executive Officer R.J. Scaringe explained to analysts on Thursday that a COO would be named up coming 7 days, expressing the new executive would concentration on scaling up the company’s output and offer chain operations. “With our 2022 priorities, we’ve been extremely concentrated on making certain we have the right staff doing work in direction of our mission,” Scaringe explained on a conference phone.

The EV-maker is closely followed and backed by a very long listing of stellar investors. But it has struggled considering the fact that a blockbuster November first general public featuring as areas shortages and output hiccups have pummeled the inventory. Rivian has been without a COO given that the commencing of the 12 months when Rod Copes stepped down after significantly less than two decades on the position. 

Klein, who did not reply to a request for remark, has been at Magna given that April 2019, according to his LinkedIn profile. Considering that July 2020, he has been president of Magna Steyr, the company’s deal car or truck-production arm. Prior to that, he put in 25 several years with Daimler AG.

Tracy Fuerst, a spokeswoman for Aurora, Ontario-centered Magna, declined to comment.

Rivian expects to construct 25,000 cars in 2022, which include two customer designs and a battery-electrical delivery van for investor and customer Amazon.com Inc. Which is considerably less than fifty percent of prepared ability at its Standard, Illinois, manufacturing facility — a little something the business has blamed on source chain constraints.

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