Staff Autonomy Product Manager

Rivian•Palo Alto, CA

About The Position

Rivian is looking for a Staff Product Manager to join the Autonomy team and own the full regulatory compliance strategy for ADAS and Autonomy features across the United States and Europe. You will design and implement innovative approaches to satisfy both federal and state-level regulatory requirements spanning FMVSS, NHTSA NCAP, UNECE, Euro NCAP, and state AV operational frameworks such as the California DMV Autonomous Vehicle Program, not by following a playbook, but by building one. This role is critical to enabling not only ADAS features but also high level of autonomy (Level 3 and/or 4) programs in each region, requiring a strategist who can navigate the patchwork of state AV testing and deployment regulations, challenge conventional compliance assumptions, construct compelling technical arguments, and work closely with the homologation and legal teams to support negotiations with Technical Agencies and state authorities toward acceptance of novel development processes and data. This is a high ownership role at the intersection of engineering, product strategy and homologation.

Requirements

B.S. or M.S. in Engineering, Computer Science, or a related technical field.
Proven experience designing and developing hardware and/or software systems for ADAS and Autonomy features.
Demonstrated ability to translate complex engineering data into compelling regulatory arguments. Bonus on having an experience convincing technical authorities to accept novel approaches, not just satisfying pre-defined checklists.
Familiarity with US state and EU AV regulatory frameworks, including testing permit structures, operational requirements for autonomous driving vehicles, and the state-by-state legislative landscape for autonomous vehicle deployment.
Broad understanding of automotive components, development tools, and systems engineering processes.
Mastery of data-driven storytelling: using large-scale data to identify trends, validate hypotheses, and build the case for mission-critical decisions with external stakeholders.
Proven ability to root-cause complex issues across the stack and implement solutions in real-time safety-critical systems.
Ability to drive progress across a multi-domain, multi-component system in a fast-paced development environment.
Strong communication and leadership skills; able to guide cross-functional engineering teams through complex regulatory and consumer rating requirements — and to represent Rivian's technical position credibly to Technical agencies, regulatory authorities, and standards bodies.
Highly motivated to take features from R&D through to production-ready, certified, and operationally permitted products.

Responsibilities

Own end-to-end regulatory approval and consumer rating requirements for ADAS and Autonomy features, securing Type Approvals and NCAPs across North America and Europe and sustaining compliance through continuous OTA software update cycles, defining the process where none exists.
Lead Rivian's state level Autonomous Vehicle (AV) regulatory strategy in the US, including supporting the obtainment and maintenance of AV testing and deployment permits (e.g., CA DMV Autonomous Vehicle Testing and Driverless Testing permits), and proactively tracking the evolving operational regulations across key states to unblock Rivian’s high level of Autonomy programs.
Develop product requirements and process frameworks for ADAS and Autonomy compliance and build a development and testing pipeline for both virtual and physical tests, which ensures those requirements in ways regulators and technical agencies will accept for initial Type Approval and ongoing regulatory maintenance.
Collaborate with the homologation and legal teams to support engagement with Technical Agencies, federal regulatory authorities (NHTSA, State DMVs, UNECE) and NCAP committees (US NCAP, Euro NCAP), providing the product and engineering substance needed to build the case for accepting Rivian's data, logic, and methodology.
Work closely within the Autonomy engineering team to ensure AV operational requirements including safety driver protocols, incident reporting, and fleet data obligations are embedded into the product development process from day one, not retrofitted at launch.
Drive cross functional collaboration with Autonomy engineering, validation, legal, and Vehicle Product and Strategy teams to align compliance priorities with feature development timelines.
Build alignment on virtual testing/ simulation strategy, internally and with the homologation and legal teams, pioneering acceptance of new approaches where standards have not yet caught up to the technology.
Monitor per component software metrics to track feature performance against regulatory and consumer rating requirements, driving action to close gaps.
Construct and maintain compliance reporting systems and archival evidence for regulatory submissions, state permit applications, and consumer rating assessments across all target regions.