Three top executives at Tesla resigned in two weeks

Viecha followed Tesla senior vice president Drew Baglino, who resigned from the company last week. Baglino was one of only four named executives at Tesla and led the engineering and technology development of the car’s batteries. Baglino had been with the company for 18 years and was well known to investors and analysts. Additionally, Rohan Patel, the company’s vice president of public policy and business development, said he would part ways with Tesla.

Viecha made the comments at the end of a first-quarter earnings conference call, which many see as a crucial crossroads for the company following its worst quarter in four years. The call featured a more subdued presence from CEO Elon Musk, who was expected to reassure investors about Tesla’s future. Many of these investors reportedly worked closely with Viecha, who confirmed his departure in positions on X and LinkedIn.

“About a month ago, I spoke with Elon and (CFO) Vaibhav (Taneja), to announce that I am going to retire from the world of investor relations and move on,” Viecha said in his message. “Working for Tesla for the past 7 years has been the greatest privilege of my professional life.”

Viecha said he was leaving to “take a break and spend a lot of time with my family.”

While Tesla’s earnings announcement was encouraging for investors and sent the stock up more than 12% in after-hours trading, the outings rattled some Tesla investors who have been critical of Musk. Particularly because Viecha had strong relationships with Tesla investors, including those who were perplexed by some of Musk’s behavior.

Speaking on CNBC, Wedbush technology analyst Dan Ives said Tesla needs an “adult in the room” and Musk rose to the occasion today. However, Ross Gerber cautioned that Ives and others should not overweight Musk’s performance on the call with other company signals, including executive departures.

“Dan, you’re dismissing the end of the call with Martin’s resignation,” said Gerber, CEO of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management. “You and I have worked with Martin for a long time and he is the glue between management, shareholders and investors.”

Gerber said another executive leaving the company, especially at such a delicate time in its history, could indicate a trend. Musk “continues to lose seasoned senior executives during this really important transition and I find that concerning,” Gerber said.

He noted, however, that he agreed with the vision outlined by Musk, but that he hoped to see better alignment between Musk’s words about his vision and the reality of the automaker.

“The problem is there is no demand for these vehicles, even if they were flying,” Gerber said.