Job cuts have gutted Tesla’s delivery team, say former workers
The layoffs could fuel investor fears that demand in the US for the Model 3 — which is crucial to the carmaker’s long-term profitability — has tailed off
San Francisco — When Tesla announced in January a second round of job cuts to rein in costs, one crucial department was particularly badly hit. The carmaker more than halved the division that delivers its electric vehicles to North American customers, two of the laid-off workers said. About 150 employees out of a team of about 230 were let go in January at the Las Vegas facility that gets tens of thousands of Model 3s into the hands of US and Canadian buyers, they said, in a sign the company expected the pace of deliveries to significantly slow in the near term. The cuts, which have not been previously reported, could fuel investor worries that demand for the Model 3 in the US has tailed off after a large tax break for consumers expired last year and the car remains too expensive for most consumers. Tesla has said its focus this quarter is on supplying cars to customers waiting in China and Europe. “There are not enough deliveries,” one of the former employees told Reuters. “You don...
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