Musk-like or not, this 36-year-old CEO has Amazon riding shotgun

Rivian Automotive founder R.J. Scaringe approached deep-pocketed Saudi investors in late 2011 with an audacious proposal. With hat in hand, the now-36 year old entrepreneur confessed he had no experience running a company. He admitted his initial prototype—a battery-powered sports car much like Tesla Inc.’s Roadster—was the wrong idea, and planned to build a pickup instead.

Of course, he didn’t have a truck to show then. What he did have was something in common with Mohammed Abdul Latif Jameel, the chairman of a Saudi auto distributor who, like Scaringe, also attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Scaringe showed up recommended by MIT contacts, and playing the alumni card worked.

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