Mustapha El Akkari is now the senior director of structures and raw materials at Rivian. The job he leaves as an executive at Tesla was that of managing the Cybertruck supply chain. Here’s a look at what he worked on and how his skills could come into play for rival Rivian.
In his role at Tesla, El Akkari essentially had the power to dictate the spending of about $16 billion in order to obtain raw materials. He managed dozens of supplier relationships across three continents and according to his LinkedIn page, generated over $1 billion in savings for Tesla during his time there.
In a statement on his LinkedIn page, El Akkari thanked some of his co-workers at Tesla. “Excited to be leading Structures and Raw Materials at Rivian after an incredible 4+ years with Tesla. Grateful for my journey at Tesla… Julio Zuverza & Roshan Thomas, thank you for believing in me and for empowering me to grow. Rivian buckle up, it’s gonna be a wild ride!” he said.
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His hiring could mean good things for Rivian if he can help the automaker improve its connections, lower spending, and increase efficiency. As the R1T and R1S continue to see new features and configurations come online, Rivian is still in the process of bringing its R2 platform to production. El Akkari could assist with those goals.
As noted by Gizmodo, El Akkari is not the first Tesla exec that has moved to its rival. Charly Mwangi, Tesla’s former senior director of engineering, and Nick Kalayjian, its former VP of engineering, also made the jump to Rivian in the not-too-distant past. Mwangi does no longer work for Rivian but Kalayjian continues to serve as the automaker’s chief product development officer.
Will El Akkari’s departure slow the production timeline for Cybertruck? At this seemingly late stage we certainly doubt it but until the electric pickup actually goes into “mass ramp-up” we’ll just have to wait and see.
