Tesla Axes Entire Supercharger Team, Plus Senior Executives

Tom Jowitt,
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Elon Musk dismisses two senior Tesla executives, plus the entire division that runs Tesla’s Supercharger network

The cost cutting continues at Tesla, as the EV maker struggles to deal with falling sales and waning consumer demand.

The Financial Times reported that Elon Musk has shut down the division that runs Tesla’s supercharger business, and has also dismissed two senior executives.

Last week Tesla had posted its biggest revenue drop since 2012, while profits fell over 50 percent amid its ongoing restructuring.

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Image credit: Unsplash

Cost cutting

According to the FT report, Musk had announced internally on Monday that the head of the superchargers group, Rebecca Tinucci, and Daniel Ho, head of new products, would be leaving along with their entire teams.

About 500 people were in the supercharger group, the memo said.

The entire public policy unit will also be disbanded following the departure of its leader, Rohan Patel, in the middle of April.

“Hopefully these actions are making it clear that we need to be absolutely hard core about headcount and cost reduction,” Musk reportedly stated. “While some on exec staff are taking this seriously, most are not yet doing so.”

Any manager “who retains more than three people who don’t obviously pass the excellent, necessary and trustworthy test” should resign, he added.

The company last month had announced its largest-ever round of layoffs, affecting more than 10 percent of staff worldwide (or 14,000 jobs).

Supercharger domination

Tesla’s supercharger network is the largest EV charging networks in the world, with 50,000 sites globally and 15,000 in North America.

Recently it has signed contracts with rival EV makers including Ford, General Motors and Rivian, to use its NACS charging standard.

It is fair to say that Tesla’s supercharger network has played a significant role in convincing car buyers to move from ICE (internal combustion engine) powered vehicles and into EVs from Tesla.

Indeed, Tesla’s supercharger network dominates the EV charging market, and its presence (and expansion) is necessary to convince drivers to migrate from ICE vehicles and reassure of them of their EV “range anxiety” concerns.

It is therefore fair to say the dismissal of the entire supercharger team has lead to concerns about the future of this operation.

But Elon Musk tweeted on X (formerly Twitter) that the supercharger network will still grow, but more more slowly.

Tinucci, Ho and Patel are not the only long-standing Musk lieutenants to leave this year, the Financial Times reported.

Drew Baglino, senior vice-president leading Tesla’s engineering and technology development for batteries, motors and energy products, resigned 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.