Electric car manufacturer Tesla Motors announced on Tuesday (Jun 12) it was cutting nine per cent of its workforce to enhance profitability but said the move would not affect an ambitious production ramp-up of its Model 3 sedan. Tesla to cut 9pc of staff, says layoffs won’t affect Model 3 production, (AFP Photo/Johannes Eisele) The job cuts are part of a company-wide restructuring to address excess staff in some areas due to the company’s speedy growth, Tesla chief Elon Musk said in an email to employees. The cuts concern salaried staff but not production workers and will not affect Model 3 output targets, said Musk, who characterized the downsizing as an acknowledgement of the need to focus more on costs. “Given that Tesla has never made an annual profit in the almost 15 years since we have existed, profit is obviously not what motivates us,” Musk said in the message. “What drives us is our mission to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable, clean energy, but we will never achieve that mission unless we eventually demonstrate that we can be sustainably profitable,” Musk added. “That is a valid and fair criticism of Tesla’s history to date.” The layoff affects almost 4,000 workers, based on figures supplies by the company. Musk said last month that the company would conduct a “sort of reorganisation” but did not discuss specifics. Musk said on Tuesday the company would continue to hire for critical roles and that finding additional production staff remained a priority. Musk… [Read full story]
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