Tesla’s Massive Restructuring: Musk Fires Senior Execs, Plans Layoffs as Sales Slump

Elon Musk has let go of two senior executives at Tesla and is planning mass layoffs after expressing frustration over declining sales figures and a slowdown in cost-cutting efforts. According to reports by The Information, Rebecca Tinucci, who oversaw the company’s Supercharger business, and Daniel Ho, head of new vehicle development, will both leave their positions on Tuesday morning. Musk also intends to dismiss all employees working under these two executives – approximately 500 in total. Furthermore, Tesla is set to dissolve its public policy team led by former executive Rohan Patel. In an email sent out to senior managers, Musk reportedly stated: “Hopefully these actions are making it clear that we need to be absolutely hardcore about headcount and cost reduction.” The CEO added that while some members of the exec staff were taking this issue seriously, others had yet to do so in earnest.
In addition, Patel’s resignation, alongside baglino Drew (leader on battery development) a couple of weeks earlier at the height of a wide-scale layoff affecting more than 10% of Tesla’s workforce, was already disclosed publicly. Elsewhere Musk appeared to have softened in tone around planned overseas forays last week following revelations about why his Chinese adventure and prospective first Asian gig had been called off. After abandoning a proposed trip to India because he claimed “very heavy Tesla obligations,” the billionaire entrepreneur visited Beijing over the weekend, where it’s believed that Musk held discussions with government officials on advancing driver assistance systems for automobiles in line with emerging legal provisions that sanction more relaxed automated motoring scenarios across urban streets as of early this year. This came shortly after Tesla revealed a decrease in quarterly revenues – the first such dip since 2018 – during its most recent financial results update, following months where falling sales and escalating price competition between electric car makers had come to prominence.