The wave of layoffs Tesla does not stop According to information from Bloombergthe automaker led by Elon Musk laid off 200 employees whose responsibility was to work on the development and improvement of Autopilot, its autonomous driving system. In addition to being one of the biggest cuts Tesla has made, it’s also surprising that it’s in an area so important to the company.
The affected workers, who carried out their activities in the California facilities, were notified of their dismissal during the course of Tuesday, June 28. For the most part, those affected specialized in Autopilot data analysis. Another group of employees who managed to keep their jobs was transferred to another office, but they continue to breathe an atmosphere full of uncertainty.
And it is that last June 21 Elon Musk warned that a wave of layoffs was approaching at Tesla. His plan contemplates reducing the global workforce by up to 3.5%.
The first cuts have affected software engineers and staff in the human resources department. In fact, the second area lost Bobby Berretta-Paris, who until just a few weeks ago was serving as a recruiter and president of the LGBTQ+ community within Tesla. His dismissal evidently caused innumerable criticisms against the company because this could create a hostile environment against minorities.
Tesla enters a legal conflict over layoffs
Beyond the bad image generated by this situation, Tesla is also facing a legal situation. Some former employees sued the automaker for allegedly not following US federal laws regarding firings.
Specifically, the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1988 establishes that, when a company has a workforce of 100 or more employees, it must give notice of mass layoffs at least 60 days in advance. In the case of Tesla, however, they apparently did not meet this point.
John Lynch and Daxton Hartsfield, the workers leading the lawsuit, they want other affected colleagues to join the claim. We’ll see how this thing turns out as more people lose their jobs at Tesla. “Let’s not give too much weight to a precautionary lawsuit that has no basis,” said Elon Musk.
Although reducing the workforce by 3.5% means leaving many employees, Elon Musk points out that within a year Tesla will have an even larger workforce. The reason? They are growing their operations in markets beyond the US.
After today’s layoffs, it will be interesting to see how Autopilot development progresses with a team that has lost 200 people so far. We intuited that they were employees whose activity was expendable at this time, because as mentioned above, Tesla’s autonomous driving system is a fundamental piece for the future.