The high turnover in Tesla’s top positions continues: Emmanuel Lamacchia, the programme manager responsible for Tesla’s top sellers, is now leaving the company. He had been with Tesla for almost eight years, most recently as head of Model Y. Before joining the Texas-based electric car pioneer, the manager worked for Rolls-Royce Engines.
According to Electrek, the parallel departures of Awasthi and Lamacchia mean that Tesla’s vehicle programme managers have been completely replaced within a year. Lamacchia himself announced his departure on LinkedIn: “After 8 incredible years, I’m moving on from Tesla. What a journey it’s been… from leading NPI for Model 3 and Model Y variants to becoming the Vehicle Program Manager for Model Y, the best-selling car in the world!”
Lamacchia describes the launch of the brand-new Model Y as the highlight of his career, particularly “converting all 4 factories across 3 continents in just 2 weeks. Something that had never been done before in the auto industry.” Tesla taught him how to work quickly and safely and how to scale from prototypes to millions of units. What’s next for the manager remains to be seen: “Excited for what’s next. More to share soon,” Lamacchia concludes his LinkedIn post. He does not comment on his reasons for leaving.
Last year, Daniel Ho, head of all vehicle programmes and responsible for the successful development of Tesla’s first production vehicle, the Model 3, and David Zhang, Tesla’s second-highest programme manager for vehicle programmes after Ho, had already left the company. Ho moved to Waymo after ten years at Tesla.
Zooming out from the vehicle programmes, the exodus of executives at Tesla becomes even more apparent. The German business publication Manager Magazin summarises that the managers who have turned their backs on Tesla in recent months include Troy Jones, head of sales for the North American market, Milan Kovac, head of the team for Tesla’s humanoid robot Optimus, and Vineet Mehta, head of battery development. In addition, the departure of Omead Afshar, previously head of North American and European operations, attracted attention in the summer. According to media reports, he was dismissed.
Tesla has always had high staff turnover, even at the top management level. One major departure was that of long-time Chief Financial Officer Zach Kirkhorn in the summer of 2023. The suspension of Rebecca Tinucci’s entire Supercharger team in spring 2024 also made headlines: Tinucci now works for Uber. Jenna Ferrua, Tesla’s head of human resources for North America, also left the company this year.
Tesla itself rarely comments on its personnel and hierarchies. Externally, Tesla is represented by only three executives: in addition to Musk himself as CEO, these are Chief Financial Officer Vaibhav Taneja and Tom Zhu, Senior Vice President for the automotive division. Zhu, who was long considered an internal rising star, returned to China in early 2024, according to an earlier report in the Wall Street Journal, and is now performing his role from there.
linkedin.com via manager-magazin.de (in German), electrek.co
This article was first published by Cora Werwitzke for electrive’s German edition.
