Tesla Death Watch 23: Tesla In Trouble. Or Not.

Robert Farago
by Robert Farago

As much as I’d like to join the rest of the autoblogosphere and simply repeat the news that Tesla’s about to terminate 100 employees and maybe their CEO (named after an Isaac Asimov character) and then say “I told you so,” I can’t. As far as I can tell, it’s nothing but a rumor. I’ve managed to trace back the report to Jalopnik, that links to a tiny item on the affiliated Valleywag website. “In our inbox, rumor of a staggering blow to one of Silicon Valley’s new growth industries: Tesla Motors, a tipster tells us, is laying off 100 people, about half of its staff. CEO Ze’ev Drori is also leaving, he claims.” The fact that Tesla hasn’t moved to squash this report, which has already circled the globe, shows that either it’s true or untrue (and someone at Tesla really needs to set a Google alert). I’ll go out on a limb and call bullshit. As long as Tesla has such a high media profile, this PR scam conmpany has a lot more mileage left in it. For which the Lord has made us truly grateful.

Robert Farago
Robert Farago

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  • Paul Niedermeyer Paul Niedermeyer on Oct 15, 2008

    Jalopnik is running an update that "restructuring" has been confirmed by Tesla, due to a "difficult nine months". But Tesla says the numbers of layoffs reported is "exaggerated".

  • Bunter1 Bunter1 on Oct 15, 2008

    Autoblog says that Drori is moving to vicechairman and Musk is picking up CEO. Some layoffs seem to be confirmed. Auntie Em, Auntie Em...not Tesla too? Economics will get you my pretty and your little electric car too! Bunter

  • JEC JEC on Oct 15, 2008

    Whoop dee doo, I haven't been impressed by this car since day one. If they do tank I'll enjoy the evil smug sense of self satisfaction I get whenever some overly ambitious green campaign goes teats up. Yes, I'm a bad, bad man.

  • Orenwolf Orenwolf on Oct 15, 2008

    Fucking Valleywag.

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