Customer rides of the Model S Beta
Electric car maker Tesla Motor’s stock saw one of its sharpest drops in months on Friday on the news that two of its execs have left, report Bloomberg and Forbes. Tesla’s shares closed at $ 22.79, which was a 19.33 percent drop for the day, though the shares rebounded a bit in after hours trading. Bloomberg calls it “the biggest slide [for Tesla] since June 29, 2010.”
Tesla confirmed with Bloomberg that Peter Rawlinson, Tesla’s VP and chief engineer (the guy with the charming English accent in their videos) has left as well as Nick Sampson, who oversaw Model S vehicle engineering. Tesla says Rawlinson left for personal reasons.
Seems like investors were particularly skittish because both Rawlinson and Sampson worked on the upcoming Model S electric sedan, and that car is supposed to come out in the summer. Tesla has said it’s committed to the car arriving for the first customers “no later than July 2012.”
Tesla says Tesla Model S Program Director Jerome Guillen has taken over for Rawlinson’s duties, and the car company has hired another exec as well, former Volkswagen AG executive, Eric Bach. Below is our interview with Guillen back when the Model S was in its Alpha stage:
Watch this video for free on GigaOM
And our first look at the Model S, with a couple of words from Rawlinson at the Fremont factory.
Watch this video for free on GigaOM
Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.
- Flash analysis: lessons from Solyndra’s fall
- Smart Grid Apps: Six Trends That Will Shape Grid Evolution
- Report: An Open Source Smart Grid Primer
