Former Ford electric vehicle chief Doug Field has been hired as president of Mind Robotics, a company with ties to Rivian.

What it means

Doug Field, the former chief EV officer at Ford and a veteran of Apple and Tesla, has been hired as president of Mind Robotics, an industrial AI and robotics startup spun out of Rivian and founded by CEO RJ Scaringe. This is a major executive hire for a company aiming to apply advanced robotics (potentially including humanoid robots) to factory automation and electric-vehicle manufacturing, leveraging Field's deep experience in EV development and complex hardware-software integration.

Accuracy & sourcesGrounded

The claim is well-supported by multiple reputable tech outlets (TechCrunch, The Verge) that report directly from an onstage announcement at TechCrunch Disrupt. The underlying source appears to be the company's own announcement and the public remarks at the event. No contradictory evidence surfaced in search results.

How new

This is genuinely new, reported on October 13, 2026, with no indication of being re-circulated older material.

Go deeper

• The Verge — first to publish