Photo: Billy Lam/National Geographic/Google/edited by autoevolution
Tesla’s fate is hanging in the balance as Elon Musk occupies his time with petty quarrels on Twitter. While investors started questioning Elon’s role at Tesla, we think it’s time he set up one of his beloved polls about him staying in charge of the EV maker company.
Elon Musk surprised everyone when he announced his intention to buy Twitter last April. We’re not sure how serious he was then, but how things went would hunt Musk for the rest of the year. He tried his best to get out of the deal, but his offer was too sweet to pass for the Twitter board. In the next months, Elon and his team struggled to find flaws in Twitter’s operations that would have been serious enough to allow him to back off. Finally, he was forced to put the money where his mouth was (or fingers, considering all went live on Twitter).
The battle over not owning Twitter must’ve taken a heavy toll on Musk’s fragile character, because it all went downhill after that. Once hailed as a brilliant manager, Musk ruined Twitter as a workplace and social platform. Erratic tweets, poll after poll, and controversies galore, Elon Musk antagonized users, advertisers, and pretty much everybody, from left to right. Musk is, nevertheless, proud of this, as he considers annoying everyone as proof of being fair.
But we’re not here to discuss Musk’s Twitter drama. His never-ending tantrum is too minuscule to matter in the grand scheme of things. We’re here to discuss Tesla and how things are going while its self-proclaimed “techno king” is waging battle after battle to shatter every last piece of his pedestal. He once pledged to save humanity and colonize Mars, but now he’s upset people booed him on stage. Musk has lost his cool, which obviously affects not only him, but also the companies he was supposed to oversee.
Tesla shares have crashed into the ground since the Twitter drama started. None of Musk’s tweets from the past couple of months are related to electric vehicles, batteries, or other technologies. The Boring Company is quietly abandoning plans to change transportation, while his Neuralink company seems to have hit a wall with regulators over animal welfare. SpaceX is still going by as planned since it’s an important company for the U.S. government, and Musk seems to still find time to share tweets about its achievements. As for Tesla, it’s total silence.
The public has no idea what Tesla plans for the near future. Since Musk dissolved it years ago, there has been no public relations department to provide updates to the media. The Model 3 is supposed to have a refresh soon, but Tesla’s lineup is still one of the oldest in the industry. Meanwhile, Tesla is in the middle of a difficult ramp-up at Giga Texas and Giga Berlin, while being under attack from all sides by other car companies.
Recently, Bloomberg reported that Musk brought Tesla China boss Tom Zhu to the U.S. to oversee production ramp-up at Giga Texas. Tesla or Musk did not confirm the move, but the Chinese media went even further with speculations. Supposedly, Zhu went to the U.S. to replace Musk as CEO. This is not a bad idea, especially considering Musk’s Twitter distraction and unpredictable state of mind.
Tesla investors have already expressed concerns over Musk’s tenure as Tesla’s CEO. Musk sold a huge number of Tesla shares, contributing to the tanking of the stock. Many investors would’ve wanted Tesla to step in and buy shares to stabilize the price, but there’s no one seemingly running Tesla at the moment.
“We’re in literally the best part of the company’s history, and it’s being totally demolished by Twitter,” Ross Gerber, a Tesla investor who supported Musk’s Twitter bid, told Washington Post. “I think the stock would rally big-time if they just said, ‘Elon’s not CEO of Tesla anymore.’”
Musk has also taken a political stance lately, which is not the wisest thing to do. Elon’s controversial views are on a collision course with his companies’ interests, considering that EV buyers mainly come from a public he mockingly labeled as “woke liberals.” As you’d imagine, investors are annoyed, and Gary Black, the managing partner of Future Fund LLC, a Tesla investor, voiced his concern.
“He will realize soon (if not already) that his polarizing political views are hurting customer perceptions of [Tesla] EVs,” Black wrote in a tweet. “Customers don’t want their cars to be controversial. They want to be proud as hell to drive them — not embarrassed.”
We get it that Musk is suffering from Twitter fatigue right now, and that’s why we think he seriously needs to consider stepping down. This could actually be already happening if Musk stays true to his promises. Earlier in the day, he set up a poll asking whether he should step down as head of Twitter.
Unsurprisingly, the poll went 57.5% in favor of this option, and now people fully expect Musk to comply. But the trillion-dollar question is whether Musk should also step down as Tesla CEO. Maybe it’s high time Elon sets up a poll to find out. As he used to say, vox populi, vox Dei.
The battle over not owning Twitter must’ve taken a heavy toll on Musk’s fragile character, because it all went downhill after that. Once hailed as a brilliant manager, Musk ruined Twitter as a workplace and social platform. Erratic tweets, poll after poll, and controversies galore, Elon Musk antagonized users, advertisers, and pretty much everybody, from left to right. Musk is, nevertheless, proud of this, as he considers annoying everyone as proof of being fair.
But we’re not here to discuss Musk’s Twitter drama. His never-ending tantrum is too minuscule to matter in the grand scheme of things. We’re here to discuss Tesla and how things are going while its self-proclaimed “techno king” is waging battle after battle to shatter every last piece of his pedestal. He once pledged to save humanity and colonize Mars, but now he’s upset people booed him on stage. Musk has lost his cool, which obviously affects not only him, but also the companies he was supposed to oversee.
Tesla shares have crashed into the ground since the Twitter drama started. None of Musk’s tweets from the past couple of months are related to electric vehicles, batteries, or other technologies. The Boring Company is quietly abandoning plans to change transportation, while his Neuralink company seems to have hit a wall with regulators over animal welfare. SpaceX is still going by as planned since it’s an important company for the U.S. government, and Musk seems to still find time to share tweets about its achievements. As for Tesla, it’s total silence.
The public has no idea what Tesla plans for the near future. Since Musk dissolved it years ago, there has been no public relations department to provide updates to the media. The Model 3 is supposed to have a refresh soon, but Tesla’s lineup is still one of the oldest in the industry. Meanwhile, Tesla is in the middle of a difficult ramp-up at Giga Texas and Giga Berlin, while being under attack from all sides by other car companies.
Recently, Bloomberg reported that Musk brought Tesla China boss Tom Zhu to the U.S. to oversee production ramp-up at Giga Texas. Tesla or Musk did not confirm the move, but the Chinese media went even further with speculations. Supposedly, Zhu went to the U.S. to replace Musk as CEO. This is not a bad idea, especially considering Musk’s Twitter distraction and unpredictable state of mind.
Tesla investors have already expressed concerns over Musk’s tenure as Tesla’s CEO. Musk sold a huge number of Tesla shares, contributing to the tanking of the stock. Many investors would’ve wanted Tesla to step in and buy shares to stabilize the price, but there’s no one seemingly running Tesla at the moment.
“We’re in literally the best part of the company’s history, and it’s being totally demolished by Twitter,” Ross Gerber, a Tesla investor who supported Musk’s Twitter bid, told Washington Post. “I think the stock would rally big-time if they just said, ‘Elon’s not CEO of Tesla anymore.’”
Musk has also taken a political stance lately, which is not the wisest thing to do. Elon’s controversial views are on a collision course with his companies’ interests, considering that EV buyers mainly come from a public he mockingly labeled as “woke liberals.” As you’d imagine, investors are annoyed, and Gary Black, the managing partner of Future Fund LLC, a Tesla investor, voiced his concern.
“He will realize soon (if not already) that his polarizing political views are hurting customer perceptions of [Tesla] EVs,” Black wrote in a tweet. “Customers don’t want their cars to be controversial. They want to be proud as hell to drive them — not embarrassed.”
We get it that Musk is suffering from Twitter fatigue right now, and that’s why we think he seriously needs to consider stepping down. This could actually be already happening if Musk stays true to his promises. Earlier in the day, he set up a poll asking whether he should step down as head of Twitter.
Unsurprisingly, the poll went 57.5% in favor of this option, and now people fully expect Musk to comply. But the trillion-dollar question is whether Musk should also step down as Tesla CEO. Maybe it’s high time Elon sets up a poll to find out. As he used to say, vox populi, vox Dei.
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