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Elon Musk has closed the division that runs Tesla’s Supercharger business, laid off two senior executives and laid off hundreds of employees as the electric car maker continues its restructuring amid a sharp decline in the electric car market.
Musk announced internally on Monday that the head of the supercharger group, Rebecca Tinucci, and Daniel Ho, head of new products, would leave along with their entire team. About 500 people were in the supercharger group, the memo said.
Tesla’s supercharger system is among the largest charging networks in the world, and it was one of the reasons why the company had such a commanding lead over rival automakers for so long. While supercharger operations will continue, the move raises questions about the future of the charging business.
The entire public order unit will also be disbanded following the departure of its head, Rohan Patel, in mid-April.
“Hopefully, these actions make it clear that we need to be absolutely hard-core about headcount and cost reduction,” Musk wrote in the memo, which was first reported by The Information. “While some leaders take this seriously, most do not yet.”
Any manager “who retains more than three people who clearly do not pass the excellent, necessary and credible test” should resign, he added.
Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.
The latest layoffs at the company come after Musk announced last month that the automaker would cut “more than 10 percent” of its total workforce, more than 14,000 jobs, to be “lean, innovative and hungry.”
The urgency of the shift was underscored by Tesla reporting a nearly 10 percent drop in revenue in the first quarter of this year, its first year-over-year quarterly decline since the start of 2020. The share price has more than halved from its November 2021 peak of just under $410 per share. stock.
The decision surprised the staff. Will Jameson, who worked on Tesla’s supercharger team, wrote X that Musk “has let our entire charging organization go”. Another employee in that division, George Bahadue, posted on LinkedIn and confirmed that he had been let go.
He added: “What this means for the charging network (North American Charging Standard) NACS, and all the exciting work we’ve been doing across the industry, I don’t know yet. What a wild ride it’s been.”
When asked by a reader at X why the entire division had been dropped, Jameson replied “your guess is as good as mine”.
Musk said in the memo that supercharger sites under construction would be finished and “some” new sites would be built.
The surprise move comes despite Tesla having built the dominant EV charging network with 50,000 locations globally and 15,000 in North America. More recently, it has signed contracts with several rivals, including Ford, General Motors and Rivian, to use its NACS charging standard.
Models from other automakers will be able to use their branded charging stations, potentially bringing Tesla a significant revenue stream, as well as establishing it as the de facto industry standard.
Tinucci, Ho and Patel aren’t the only longtime Musk lieutenants leaving this year. Drew Baglino, the senior vice president who leads Tesla’s engineering and technology development for batteries, motors and energy products, stepped down in April, and Martin Viecha, its head of investor relations, said he would step down on the company’s first-quarter earnings call last week .
In a post on his social network X, Musk said the automaker would continue to expand its supercharger network “at a slower pace for new locations.”
“More focus on 100 percent uptime and expansion of existing locations,” he wrote.
