Swear loyalty
Tesla CEO Elon Musk is laying siege to the automaker, seemingly doing everything he can to throw the company into chaos.
Late last month, news emerged that the mercurial billionaire had fired the company’s entire 500-employee Supercharger team, angering fans and leaving investors stunned.
According to four former staff members who spoke with ReutersMusk had a one-on-one meeting with the company’s former head of electric vehicle charging, Rebecca Tinucci, before the cull – and apparently didn’t like what he heard, the firing him and his entire team shortly after.
The two men reportedly disagreed on what deeper cuts Musk wanted to make, to which Tinucci balked.
Tinucci was one of the few high-ranking female executives remaining at the company and one of several senior executives who have since been fired or left of their own accord following Tesla’s disastrous quarterly earnings call.
As always, Musk’s motivations are difficult to parse. But given the chaos that followed and the likely considerable impact it leaves on the rollout of charging infrastructure across the country, it’s a difficult decision to reconcile.
Was there really a fundamental disagreement over how to go about mass layoffs, or did Tinucci simply fail Musk’s loyalty test? There is also a gender component: the billionaire already has a difficult relationship with women and has made numerous misogynistic comments in the past.
car wars
Musk has since changed course and started rehiring some members of his electric vehicle maker’s laid-off Supercharger team. Unsurprisingly, he also reappointed a male executive as head of the project, as Bloomberg reported this week.
Faced with immense backlash, Musk quickly and conveniently changed his mind: promising that it would spend “well over” $500 million to expand Tesla’s Supercharger network.
But while that number may seem high on paper, it probably doesn’t amount to much. According to research firm EVAdoption, half a billion dollars will still mean Tesla will build 77% fewer charging ports per month in the United States than at its previous pace.
The effects of Musk’s seemingly short-sighted decision are already becoming apparent. Tesla is already pulling out of key leases and ghost contractors.
“It’s just a shame that now they have to hold the bag on all these different projects,” said one of the prosecution team’s former employees. Reuters. “It’s really sad to see all these broken relationships and people being really angry – rightfully so.”
Meanwhile, Musk is still determined to score himself one of the largest corporate payouts in history, with the company tracking down a loophole in Delaware corporate law to restore his $56 billion pay package .
Learn more about Elon Musk: 98% of drivers who try Tesla’s full self-driving demo abandon it after the trial period ends
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