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Bloomberg
Tesla Inc laid off hundreds of workers on its Autopilot team as the electric-vehicle maker shuttered a California facility, according to people familiar with the matter.
Most of the roughly 200 people let go were hourly workers, the people said late Tuesday, a surprise given that Tesla previously disclosed headcount reductions targeted at salaried positions. As recently as last week, Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk outlined a plan to boost hourly jobs.
Tesla’s shares fall 1.3% at 8:36 am on Wednesday in early trading in New York. The stock tumbled 34% this year through Tuesday’s close, compared with a 20% decline in the SP 500 Index.
Teams at the San Mateo office were tasked with evaluating customer vehicle data related to the Autopilot driver-assistance features and
performing so-called data labeling. Many of the staff were data annotation specialists, all of which are hourly positions.
Prior to the cuts, the office had about 350 employees, some of whom were already transferred to a nearby facility in recent weeks, the people said.