Tesla Management Shuffles
By Michelle Krebs August 14, 2007The big news kicking off this week is that Martin Eberhard, the co-founder and CEO of Tesla Motors, has been replaced as chief executive and will become the companyâs president of technology, according to a statement on Monday on Tesla's Web site.
Eberhard will remain with the company as president of technology. Michael Marks, the former CEO of electronics assembler Flextronics and an early investor in Tesla Motors, will take the reins as interim CEO.
Question is, does the management change suggest the company is struggling, experiencing growing pains or simply growing up?
Only last week, Tesla announced its electric sports car would be delayed due to a change in transmission suppliers. Eberhard told John O'Dell, Edmunds.com senior editor, Monday that the management changes shouldn't affect production schedules for the electric Roadster or Tesla's promised new Whitestar electric sedan.
It could be that Tesla needs its top technical person Eberhard doing the technical stuff heâs good at, and/or maybe heâs not so great at actually running the whole company. He told Edmunds.com that he will focus on the roadster program and advancement of technology. He added that the company had been looking for a CEO for some time.
Such are the growing pains small start-up companies experience.
Even big ones do the same. General Motors Rick Wagoner brilliantly lured Bob Lutz to the automaker to be vice chairman in charge of product development, an area not of Wagonerâs expertise. Ford Chairman Bill Ford recruited ex-Boeing exec Alan Mulally to run that automakerâs day-to-day operations.
How much should be read into these changes remains to be seen.
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