Elon Musk is making big changes at Tesla again, and it’s making waves in the electric vehicle (EV) industry.
A report from The Information says that Musk is cutting around 500 jobs from the Supercharger team, the group responsible for building Tesla’s fast EV chargers all around the world. One supplier called it “a sharp kick in the pants.”
Andres Pinter, who works for Bullet EV Charging Solutions, a company that helps install Tesla’s chargers, said, “My team woke up to a sharp kick in the pants this morning.” He thinks Tesla won’t give up on the charger project entirely because they’ve already gotten money from the government for it. He believes Musk might rebuild the team in a bigger and better way.
These surprise layoffs have surprised the auto industry. Many car companies have been making their EVs able to use Tesla’s charging stations. Rivian, a new EV company, was planning to let its drivers use Tesla’s stations too. They’re not sure what to do now.
Tesla’s charging stations, called Superchargers, have become really popular in the US. They’ve installed 15,000 of them across the country by 2024. Even big car companies like Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis are making their EVs compatible with Tesla’s chargers.
Some people from Tesla’s top team have also left. Rebecca Tinucci, who was in charge of the Supercharger group, and Daniel Ho, who worked on new products, are leaving. Musk wasn’t happy with how his team was doing, saying they weren’t being tough enough about cutting jobs.
Last month, Tesla let go of more than 10% of its workers worldwide.
Tesla’s stock price went down on Tuesday because of this news. Musk tried to calm down Tesla owners and suppliers by saying they still want to make more Superchargers, just not as quickly.
But there are signs that Tesla might not be adding as many new charging stations as before. They reportedly canceled plans for four new stations in New York.
William Navarro Jameson, who used to work on Tesla’s charging program, said the layoffs could be a chance for other companies to step up and compete with Tesla’s charging stations.
Tesla didn’t respond to requests for comments outside of normal working hours.
