Tesla Axing Its Supercharger Team Puts The Entire Industry In The Dark
Most of Tesla's Supercharger team was caught up in recent layoffs, leading to countless questions about the future of EV charging.
Even if you're a die-hard, paying-blue-check, all-in-on-$TSLA, Elon-can-do-no-wrong superfan, it's awfully hard to find a silver lining around the news that most—if not all—of Tesla's Supercharging team was caught up in the company's latest round of layoffs.
Last night, The Information reported that roughly 500 people in Tesla's charging division are being cut from the company, including its senior director and head of new products. A quick perusal of LinkedIn, Reddit, X and other social media platforms shows scores of people who worked on the charging team at Tesla announcing their layoffs. All of them seem utterly (and understandably) stunned that they had to. (Emails and direct messages to several current and former Tesla officials have gone unanswered.)
Moreover, Musk's own memo to the troops doesn't provide much information or reassurance about the future of charging. “We will continue to build out some new Supercharger locations, where critical, and finish those currently under construction,” Musk wrote, almost with the same level of interest as when he spoke of future Tesla models during last week's Q1 earnings call.
Astoundingly, the rest of the auto industry that was getting ready to partner with Tesla on charging seems blindsided as well today, leaving them with countless questions about what's next. "We were surprised as anyone, and have no additional information than what’s been reported," one automaker official told me.
There's no two ways about it: this move is utterly baffling. And to one degree or another, it may throw a lot of future plans for both Tesla and the American EV industry into turmoil.
