Tesla to Lay Off 10% of Staff Globally, Recruitment in China Persists
Regarding the recent news of Tesla’s suspension of global hiring, a source close to Tesla China said that no updates on layoffs have been issued, and a massive recruitment drive was conducted not long ago. “Tesla China is very strict with recruitment on its side, and there is still a shortage of talent,” according to the source cited by a Jiemian News reporting on Monday.
Since the beginning of this year, Tesla has been expanding its workforce. In 2021, Tesla recruited 28,533 employees worldwide, a substantial increase of 40.3%. The new jobs are mainly in Europe and China.
In May, Tesla Shanghai R&D Innovation Center released more than 100 job vacancies, involving five fields: vehicle software, hardware design engineering, power and energy engineering, vehicle engineering. The number of vehicle software and hardware design engineering positions accounted for half of them.
SEE ALSO: Tesla’s Shanghai R&D Center Heavily Recruits New Talent
A Tesla China insider told Jiemian News that this recruitment was more vigorous than the past. “There were relatively more mid-and-high recruits before, and this time is mainly for engineers.”
Reuters reported on June 4 that Tesla CEO Elon Musk said in an email sent to executives last week that Tesla needed to lay off 10% of its employees and planned to suspend the global recruitment plan. When the news came out, Tesla’s share price dropped by more than 9%.
Recently, Musk has made frequent moves in employee management. Before announcing the layoffs, Musk sent an email to employees all over the world, asking them to return to work in the office. “Everyone at Tesla is required to spend a minimum of 40 hours in the office per week,” and “if you don’t show up, we will assume you have resigned”.
Many Tesla employees expressed dissatisfaction with Musk’s requirement. According to Reuters, some employees said, “If there is a large-scale turnover, how will Tesla complete the project? I don’t think investors will be happy about this.”
