He left Jeep for Rivian. Here's why, what's next.
Designer creates electric truck, SUV, van that inspire ride-along lines at the Detroit Auto Show
Just two dinners.
That’s all it took to steal away Jeff Hammoud, chief of design for the bestselling Jeep brand, after roughly 13 years working for its parent company Fiat Chrysler Automobiles.
He said he loved his job — especially working on the Wrangler and Grand Cherokee. He loved working at Chrysler. But after meeting for dinner (twice) with RJ Scaringe, Hammoud chose to submit his resignation and join a little-known startup called Rivian to build electric vehicles.
Now, almost eight years later, the transportation design alum from the College of Creative Studies in downtown Detroit (who also earned an MBA from Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan) is credited with leading a team that has created one of the most recognizable automotive brands in history — from scratch.
“I wasn’t really that interested in going to a startup or trying something new. I wasn’t unhappy where I was at,” Hammoud told me.
“This friend of mine urged me, ‘It doesn’t hurt to just meet with RJ.’ Honestly, I had two dinners with RJ. It was really RJ that sold me. He’s such a charismatic guy and felt, all right, this guy is going to be successful whether he makes cars or toasters,” he said. “I weighed it out to myself. What would I regret more, doing this and failing? Or not doing it and seeing it succeed and not being a part of it?”
At the time, his former employer was focused not at all on future electrification and entirely on old ICE (internal combustion engine) technology, he said. “It was very much about putting Hellcat motors in different things. I didn’t see this, sort of, future plan. That kind of concerned me … I said, ‘I don’t know when I’ll be able to get this opportunity again, so why don’t I take a chance?’”
A design trailblazer, then and now
These days, the 45-year-old chief design officer at Rivian is known by industry analysts as a visionary because the vehicles are so distinct and recognizable.
“Rivian is definitely known as a design leader. A lot of traditional automakers look to Rivian in terms of design,” said Maeva Ribas, director of The CARLAB, an automotive consulting group in Southern California. “It’s a boxy design and it doesn’t look like any other car or truck.”
She added, “In the design community, Rivian has been able to start something. It’s a very straight-forward and honest design.”
The Irvine, California-based company builds the all-electric R1T (truck), R1S (SUV), Electric Delivery Van (used by Amazon) and the Rivian Commercial Van at its plant in Normal, Illinois.
“We’re a U.S. brand,” Hammoud said. “It’s something we’re proud of.”
Amazon, the biggest stakeholder in Rivian with 17%, used the Rivian vans to deliver more than 1 billion Amazon packages in the U.S. in 2024. Rivian opens its big box commercial van to customers other than Amazon starting in February. Next year, a five-seat SUV known as R2 is headed to market.
This is the first year visitors will see Rivian at the 10-day Detroit Auto Show, giving rides in the SUV, truck and van inside Huntington Place.
Rivian vehicles had provided more than 2,769 rides with at least one passenger (and usually more) by the end of Thursday, Jan. 16, Rivian spokeswoman Kelli Felker confirmed.
Lines formed among fans eager to get a feel for the interior of the vehicles, known for their unusual headlights that look like pill-shaped eyes. Some call those halo lights.
Hammoud, who lives in Alisa Viejo, Calif., said his father wasn’t thrilled with the front-end Rivian design in pictures at first. But, in person, he said he loved it.
“I’m, like, ‘Thanks, dad,’” Hammoud said, laughing.
How do you even start to create a new brand?
Finding an identity is essential, and there are a lot of current automotive brands that still haven’t found an identity, Hammoud said.
When you look at something and walk away, can you still remember it? It is something you could describe? Could you draw pieces of it?
“That is something we really wanted to push — How do we create a new distinctive look that is ours and is very memorable, and that’s easier said than done,” Hammoud said. “It’s something we spent time on, thinking about that. The rest of the vehicle, if you look at the overall design, shape, form, vocabulary, is really simple. So we want the car to be simple and timeless but still feel premium.”
The distinctive headlights happened after a bit of creative collaboration.
“The original design that we started looking at, it just had a horizontal light bar that went across the front,” Hammoud said. “It kind of looked pretty techie but didn’t really have personality … We really push the team to … look at automotive so you can know what competition is doing, but not for inspiration. So we looked at a lot of lifestyle products that we thought our customer would be using.”
They found on one of the tables an aluminum carabiner hook often used by rock climbers. One designer suggested it be incorporated into the vehicle design to help attach kayaks. Hammoud wondered about the headlight shape. Then the designers merged the horizontal light bar and intersected the shapes and ended up with the design that exists today
“We always want to continue to push ourselves to innovate,” Hammoud said “You look at a lot of brands out there and some of them send a very distinct message about who you are as a person when you’re driving them. Some people love that and other people don’t. One of the customers said something I really liked a lot: ‘Rivian is very luxurious and I really like it but I feel like it’s luxurious for me, not for everyone else looking at it.’ We want to be bold and have the distinctive look to it but it doesn’t want to be pretentious.”
Rivian made headlines late last year with news of its joint venture with Volkswagen Group, which has committed billions of dollars to transform its technology.
“The incumbent (automakers) just don’t know how to do software,” Hammoud said. “Two companies have been successful at it, basically Tesla and now us.”
Customers don’t fully understand yet that software means more than just infotainment, he said. “People get annoyed with their phones when they’re out of date. Basically, a car is a rolling computer but why shouldn’t you be able to enhance the experience of the car though software?”
Whether it’s different blind spot camera views or new drive modes, Rivian vehicles on the road today will get better with age, Hammoud said. “We develop a new feature and we do an update and now you’ve got this feature and it didn’t cost you any money.”
A little boy who loved art and cars
Hammoud knew he wanted to be a car designer since age 6. “I loved cars. I loved art.”
He learned from his dad’s car magazine that “automotive designer” was a thing.
By the time Hammoud was in high school and asking questions, no one in his town outside of Toronto, Canada, knew much about automative design. People told him to study engineering. After seeing the mechanical engineering curriculum, Hammoud realized it had nothing to do with art. What about drawing cars?
So, he did more research and narrowed his choices down to the Royal College of Art in London, England; the ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, Calif.; and the College of Creative Studies in Detroit.
He studied under chief design officer Ralph Gilles at Stellantis.
And the student went on to make a name for himself globally, too.
Rivian: From cash burn to VW Group partner
“Rivian is definitely a player,” said John McElroy, analyst at Autoline. “I’ve only talked to a couple of people who own them but they love them to pieces. What’s particularly impressive is that Rivian has followed the Tesla model and developed a software-defined vehicle. Every single function in the car is operated by software.”
Everyone else, he said, “is struggling like hell.”
Volkswagen spent a lot of money, failed miserably and delayed development of brands including Audi and Porsche, McElroy said. Finally, the Europeans threw in the towel and decided to do a deal with Rivian for up to $5.8 billion. “As soon as I saw that, I said Rivian is good to go.”
Rivian was founded in Detroit and moved west. In 2019, Ford Motor Co. announced its investment in Rivian. By 2021, the plan to produce a vehicle together had withered and the joint venture fell apart. Ford proceeded with electric vehicles on its own.
In 2024, Rivian topped Ford to become the bestselling electric van in the U.S.
This week, Rivian and the U.S. Department of Energy finalized a loan agreement for a new manufacturing site in Georgia.
A name is never just a name
The Rivian team has gathered individual stories at the Detroit Auto Show to discuss back at its Irvine, Calif., headquarters. This is my favorite:
Tony Everett, a Rivian marketing consultant from Brooklyn, New York, met a couple named Joseph and Vanessa who had a 3-month-old daughter, Rivian. “They explained that it’s a combination of the names of two very important women in their lives: Joseph’s great-grandmother, Vivian, and Vanessa’s mother, Rita … Joseph also told me that one day, while scrolling through Google, he came across the Rivian brand. He thought it was an amazing coincidence that a company shared the same name they had chosen for their future child.”
Coming home again
Hammoud returns from the west coast to Detroit to visit friends or deliver a speech. He used to live in Lake Orion and, later, Bloomfield Hills.
“Somebody was asking me, ‘What feels like home to you?’ I fly back to Canada because that’s my home country. But it doesn’t feel like home,” Hammoud said. “When I get to Michigan, it feels like home to me, still.”
We have one Rivian in our town, driven by a well known retired gentleman. Everyone knows Skip and his unique pickup! I love learning more about his vehicle and its origins. Cool story.
I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and I see them all the time. Every person I’ve talked to that owns one loves it.