Remake of the world's costliest divorce: Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe’s voting control slips after divorce settlement

There has been a remake, or kinda, of the world's costliest divorce, the one between Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Scott. In 2019, Bezos and MacKenzie Scott got divorced. The break-up saw Scott receive 400 million shares in Amazon, lowering Bezos' stake. In a similar case, Rivian founder and CEO RJ Scaringe has seen a slip in his voting control and ownership of the company following his divorce settlement. According to a regulatory filing, Rivian CEO Scaringe has transferred a portion of his ownership stake and voting power as part of a newly settled divorce proceeding.Scaringe founded Rivian in 2009. He got married in the year 2014. Records obtained from Orange County Superior Court show that Scaringe filed for divorce in October 2023, with his ex-wife agreeing to separate in another filing one month later.

Change in voting power at Rivian

Scaringe’s ownership stake in Rivian was 2% prior to the divorce settlement, according to the proxy filing. But he had a 7.6% share of the voting power, thanks in part to the Class B stock, which comes with 10 votes per share. (Rivian’s Class A stock only comes with 1 vote per share.) The transfer of shares and options in the settlement cuts his voting power to around 4%.

How many shares of Rivian have gone to RJ Scaringe’s wifeScaringe reportedly moved about 4 million shares and 6 million options to his ex-wife, Meagan Scaringe, on July 9 as part of the settlement, the filing shows. At Rivian’s current stock price, those shares and options could be worth roughly $130 million, though they have varying strike prices that would affect the total return if sold. The change in stock ownership comes at the end of a two-year-long divorce proceeding, court documents show.Scaringe owned more than 15 million shares of Class A stock and nearly 8 million Class B shares when the company submitted its annual proxy report April 29. As a result of the transfer, Scaringe’s voting power has slipped from 7.6% earlier this year to around 4%, the lowest since Rivian’s 2021 IPO.

New ownership structure of Rivian

The ownership structure of Rivian has changed since its IPO in 2021. At that time, Amazon and Ford were among the largest stakeholders. This has changed now. Ford is largely out and Germany's Volkswagen Group has emerged as a major player. In late 2024, Rivian entered into a joint venture valued at $5.8 billion with Volkswagen focused on software and electrical architecture. Rivian has provided technology and employees to the joint venture, while Volkswagen has largely contributed money in the form of share purchases and convertible debt.As a result, Volkswagen now owns 12.3% of Rivian. This puts it slightly behind Amazon, which owned 14.2% of Rivian as of the April 2025 proxy filing. That’s enough to give Amazon the most voting power of any single shareholder: 13.3%.