Tesla is cutting even more workers, including senior executives and longtime company veterans. Notable examples include the entire Supercharging team and executives in charge of negotiating NACS adoption across the industry, shortly after the company laid off "over 10%" of its global workforce.

In late April’24, Tesla announced mass layoffs.

The company as a whole saw a large number of layoffs. At the Gigafactory Texas, Tesla shortened the length of its production shifts, eliminated key project teams, and even fired high-ranking executives.

Among them was Drew Baglino, leader of the 4680-cell project and former vice president of powertrain and energy engineering for the corporation, where he worked for eighteen years. Although he publicly offered his resignation as voluntary, it is speculated that his resignation was motivated by dissatisfaction with the progress of the 4680 projects.

During the initial round of layoffs, Rohan Patel, Tesla's head of policy and business development, was also let go.

As we discovered last week, the business also let go of its entire new team.

However, initial reports we received regarding Tesla's impending layoffs indicated that more than 20% of the company's workforce could be affected. Although there were other signs that layoffs were imminent, this particular signal came from an unidentified person at Tesla who was correct in predicting the timing of the layoffs but wrong in estimating their size.

More layoffs are now complete, according to an email from Tesla CEO Elon Musk to executives that was previously obtained by The Information. In it, Rebecca Tinocki, the company's senior director of EV charging for six years, announced that she and her 500-person charging team will leave on Tuesday (the information also notes that "a few” (Employees will be reassigned to other teams.)

Since Tinucci oversaw all aspects of Tesla's EV charging operations, including Supercharging, the dismissal of the Supercharger team could signal a change in Tesla's strategy. Many believe that Tesla will be able to maintain a profitable energy delivery business for a long time to come because of its significant success in getting manufacturers to adopt its NACS plug. Tinucci led the effort, earning him a spot on the TIME 100 Climate List and the #2 spot on Motor Trend's Auto Industry Power List.

According to the email, Tesla will complete the Superchargers currently under construction in addition to building additional chargers. However, relieving staff of its responsibilities could signal a slowdown in system expansion — when the need for a faster rollout of charging stations is greater.

Daniel Howe, director of vehicle programs and new product initiatives, a 10-year Ford veteran who was program manager for the Model S, 3 and Y and previously worked for the company in product roles for 12 years, is another There is executive dismissal.

Tesla had been bracing for a "pause" between development phases in recent quarters, anticipating that sales growth would be further subdued until the introduction of next-generation vehicles such as the less expensive "Model 2" and robotaxi products. will While there has been some back-and-forth over the shape of these items, the dismissal of the head of new product initiatives also points to potential problems within the team.

Additionally, the majority of the public policy team, led by former executive Rohan Patel, will be let go at a time when a number of public policy issues including home charging, DC charging, emissions regulations, climate change, and improved EV technology are on the way. Political opposition. , are still growing.

In a general flurry, Musk announced that he wanted Tesla to be "absolutely aggressive" about reducing headcount. He also threatened to relieve executives of their duties if their subordinates "do not pass the apparently excellent, necessary and reliable test", implying that he wanted these executives to hire more people. Fire or be fired yourself.

The timing of the revelation is critical for Tesla, as the company just missed revenue and delivery estimates for the quarter and saw a steep year-over-year sales decline.

It appears to be a follow-the-leader strategy. While industry earnings are still strong, Tesla's layoffs coincide with those of many other tech businesses.

Company’s Take

First of all, dismissing the Supercharger team is completely ridiculous. Tesla has a huge opportunity with Supercharging, especially since all the other companies have switched to NACS.

From this point, Tesla's case for becoming the premier "gas station of the future" is pretty straightforward. The company has an inherent advantage because of its extensive knowledge and expertise in supercharging, its superior and well-designed stations, and its established global presence with multiple stations. Now that NACS has industry-wide support, the business case is even more compelling.

It would be sheer madness to fire this entire team at a time when the company has achieved such significant success, when billions of public funds are available for expansion (which would not have been possible without the industry adopting NACS, again thanks to Tinucci's negotiations), and when lead retention is required. Just one action would make me even more suspicious of Tesla's CEO.

In our coverage of the Tesla layoffs, we pointed out that, in general, the worst thing about such situations is that they have a significant negative impact on morale. After the massive layoffs, we understand that Tesla's morale may not be stellar just yet, but it can at least feel a sense of satisfaction that the layoff era is over.

However, that sense of comfort will wear off if Tesla continues to lay off workers, and the unemployed continue to worry about working, as we've heard with many workers on the first day of layoffs. It happened.

And even if the previous round of layoffs was unpleasant enough, the optics of more layoffs are pretty bad, considering that Tesla cut $55 billion in compensation for its CEO just days after laying off 14,000 workers. The $55 billion could cover these workers' six-figure salaries for 40 years. A substantial salary for a part-time CEO, made worse by the possibility that additional staff will still face job losses.

One can also speculate that layoffs will increase in the future. We were informed by a reliable source — who was correct about the impending layoffs but inaccurate about their scope or timing — that up to 5% more employees, including executives and long-term workers from the Roadster era, left. can go. Although these appear to be small in scale, this layoff bears some resemblance to the rumor, so there may be more to come. Watch out for updates here.