From Tesla, xAI to X, a series of veteran leaders leave Elon Musk amid pressure, exhaustion and political conflicts – a sign of a growing rift in the most powerful technology empire on the planet
Elon Musk’s business empire has faced a wave of senior executives leaving the company in the past year, as the billionaire’s demanding and increasingly political activities have led to a sharp increase in senior-level staff turnover.
Key members of Tesla’s US sales team, battery and powertrain division, communications and external affairs, and chief information officer (CIO) have all left recently, along with core members of the Optimus robotics and AI teams, the areas where Musk has staked his bets for the company’s future.
The turnover has been even faster at xAI, the two-year-old artificial intelligence (AI) startup that Musk merged with Twitter in March. xAI’s chief financial officer (CFO) and general counsel both left the company within a week of each other, after brief stints.
It is part of a wave of departures from the conglomerate controlled by the world’s richest man, who runs five companies, including SpaceX and Tesla, and employs more than 140,000 people. More than a dozen current and former employees have shared their insider insights into the turmoil, according to the Financial Times.
“NO ONE CAN TAKE IT”
“The only constant in Elon’s world is the speed at which he burns through his deputies,” a close adviser to Musk said. “Even the board jokes that there is normal time and there is ‘Tesla time.’ There, working 24/7 is the norm, and not everyone can handle it.”
Robert Keele, xAI’s legal counsel, ended his 16-month tenure in early August by posting an AI video depicting a suit-clad lawyer screaming while shoveling molten coal with the caption: “I love my two young children, but I don’t have enough time with them.”
Mike Liberatore, CFO of xAI, lasted just 102 days before leaving for OpenAI, Musk’s biggest rival, run by Sam Altman. On LinkedIn, he wrote: “102 days, 7 days a week, 120+ hours a week; I like to work hard.”
According to multiple employees, Musk’s work intensity has increased significantly since ChatGPT launched in late 2022, shaking up the Silicon Valley establishment. Many believe that a personal confrontation with Sam Altman — who co-founded OpenAI with Musk before the two “went their separate ways” — is the reason Musk is “extremely pressuring” employees.
“Elon has a ‘stick’ in him because of ChatGPT, and he is spending every waking moment trying to find a way to beat Sam,” said a former senior executive.
Last week, xAI accused OpenAI of “poaching engineers” to steal source code and data center secrets, while OpenAI responded that this was just “the latest chapter in Musk’s harassment.”
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Some employees said they felt uneasy about Musk’s public support for Donald Trump and his defense of far-right figures in the US and Europe.
“A lot of people don’t want to have to explain to their families why they still work for Elon,” said one former employee.
Meanwhile, Tesla—once the most stable part of Musk’s empire—is also in turmoil. After cutting 14,000 employees by April 2024, a series of key executives have left, especially after Musk shifted investments away from new electric vehicle and battery projects to focus on robots, AI and self-driving taxis.
One shocking change was Musk’s cancellation of the $25,000 low-cost electric car project (internally known as NV-91, known to the community as Model 2). Daniel Ho, the director in charge of this program, left Tesla in September 2024 to join Waymo, Google’s self-driving taxi company.
Other leaders such as Rohan Patel, Hasan Nazar (public policy), Drew Baglino (energy and powertrain) and Rebecca Tinucci (Supercharger charging station division, later to Uber) also left one after another.
David Zhang, who led the rollout of the Model Y and Cybertruck, left the company in late summer; CIO Nagesh Saldi left in November; Vineet Mehta, the “soul” of the battery division, left after 18 years; and Milan Kovac, who led the Optimus robot program, left Tesla in June.
Soon after, Ashish Kumar, Optimus’s AI team leader, also moved to Meta.
The sharp decline in sales—largely due to Musk losing liberal customers because of his political views—has created further unrest among the staff. Omead Ashfar, Musk’s closest “firefighter,” was fired in June; his deputy, Troy Jones, also left after 15 years.
“Elon’s behavior is having a serious impact on morale, retention, and talent acquisition,” one former executive said bluntly. “He has gone from being loved by everyone to being supported by a small group.”
Another former employee publicly stated on social media that Musk had “caused great harm to Tesla’s mission and to democracy.”
However, Tesla President Robyn Denholm countered: “People only talk about who leaves, not who joins. Tesla is still a magnet for top talent.”
Meanwhile, at xAI, some employees have left the company over disagreements with Musk’s “absolute freedom of speech” stance and concerns about the release of AI features without safety controls. This summer, the Grok chatbot built into X praised Adolf Hitler after Musk asked it to “make it less woke.”
Former CFO Liberatore is said to have clashed with Musk’s inner circle over the company’s structure and aggressive financial targets. “People who are absolutely loyal to Elon are firing people and making very worrying safety decisions,” said one person close to the situation. “Mike is a business guy, but he also does things the right way.”
Then, Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X, resigned in July, dissatisfied with Musk’s unilateral decision-making and criticism of advertising revenue. In August, Igor Babuschkin, co-founder and chief engineer of xAI, also left to form his own AI safety research project.
A number of other communications and engineering leaders also left X and xAI, including Haofei Wang (head of product engineering), Patrick Traughber (head of payments and consumer products), Uday Ruddarraju and Michael Dalton, both of whom were later poached by OpenAI.
Amid all the troubles, Musk shows no signs of backing down. xAI’s chatbot “Anibot” – notorious for its sexually suggestive interactions with teenage users – even had Musk create a hologram to “greet employees” in the lobby of the company’s headquarters.
“He’s the boss, and anyone who doesn’t acknowledge that, he’ll find a way to eliminate,” said a former senior Tesla executive. “Elon has no gray areas. He’s extremely calculated and focused, and that makes working with him difficult. But if you’re on the same page and have the stamina, you can survive.”
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