The organizational tree at Tesla keeps shedding leaves, and a surprising number keep falling from the top with two more high-profile executives reportedly leaving the firm. 

Elon Musk has announced Rebecca Tinucci, Tesla senior director of EV charging, and Daniel Ho, director of vehicle programs and new product initiatives, are both out according to The Information. In Tinucci's case, her entire team of nearly 500 people working on Supercharging technology have also been cut. 

The email claimed Tesla would continue to finish working on Supercharger units currently under construction and would build out "some" new ones, but beyond that the future of Tesla's supercharger network - and the NACS standard championed by Tinucci that it uses - isn't clear. 

Ho's 10-year career at Tesla included time as the program manager for the Model S, 3 and Y. His departure leaves a leadership gap at a crucial time when Tesla is allegedly working on a robotaxi service and - despite earlier claims that the project was being canceled - is still pursuing a low-cost EV design as well. 

Most of the public policy team that worked under former leader Rohan Patel was also reportedly axed in Musk's latest layoff missive. Like cutting a vehicle program director, letting go a public policy team while trying to launch the first-ever driverless cabbie network in the US is a bit counterintuitive. We assume the Cybercab is right around the corner along with that robot that turned out to be a man in a suit.

Patel was one of three Tesla executives to depart earlier this month. With Tinucci and Ho being heaved, the car slinger's senior ranks are now light five people in less than three weeks. 

We've reached out to Tesla to confirm the contents of the leaked communication and to ask some additional questions, and haven't heard back. It all reminds of us of Musk tearing staff out of Twitter.

Of the latest wave of layoffs, Tesla CEO Musk said he intended to be "absolutely hard core" about the near term of employment at Tesla. Leadership was instructed to terminate any staff who "don't obviously pass the excellent, necessary and trustworthy test," meaning the automaker might continue to cut HR costs.

Tesla hasn't exactly had a good run of late. The Cybertruck has mostly been a mess; sales, profit, and other typical markers of corporate success are down; prices have been cut, and it seems like good ideas are a bit hard to come by. 

The justification for the gutting of teams whose work seems central to Tesla's current mission is questionable at best, but the cuts have to come from somewhere. 

What - you don't expect Elon to sacrifice a bit for his electric dreams, do you? ®

https://www.theregister.com//2024/04/30/musk_tesla_layoff/