Elon Musk wants to remain at the top of Tesla’s leadership – unless he is abducted by aliens

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• Elon Musk has managed Tesla since 2008
• Time pressure from SpaceX, The Boring Company, Neuralink and Twitter?
• Musk wants to stay with Tesla

Tesla CEO Musk is in trouble with the SEC

Elon Musk has been at the helm of the electric car manufacturer Tesla for several years. After the entrepreneur invested millions in the then young company in 2004 and thus became its largest shareholder, he has held the role of CEO since 2008. Nevertheless, the richest person in the world is quite controversial in his leadership role at Tesla: In 2018 Musk wrote on the short message service Twitter that he wanted to take Tesla off the stock exchange and that the financing for this was secured. This brought him into trouble with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The regulators accused the Tesla boss of misleading investors. The authority then reached an agreement with Musk, after which he gave up his position as chairman of the Tesla board of directors, but has remained CEO of the company ever since.

Chaos surrounding Twitter takeover

In addition to Tesla, Musk also has senior roles at space company SpaceX, tunnel builder The Boring Company and neurotechnology researcher Neuralink. This year, the entrepreneur also made a name for himself with the planned takeover of Twitter. Musk said in April that he wanted to buy out all of the service’s shares because users there could not exercise their right to free speech. After initial rejection, Twitter agreed a few days later with the Tesla boss on a purchase price of 44 billion US dollars. In the weeks that followed, the fronts between the two contracting parties hardened: Musk accused the service of not having provided sufficient data on fake accounts, which was tantamount to a breach of contract, which is why he wanted to withdraw from the deal. Meanwhile, Twitter announced that it intends to use legal means to complete the takeover.

“Key Figure Risk” at Tesla

At the Tesla shareholder meeting in Austin in early August, Musk received applause and a standing ovation from the crowd, and took questions from the audience and online. However, one of Tesla’s shareholders expressed concern about Tesla’s succession plan. Gary Black, managing partner of The Future Fund, explained that Tesla shares hold the largest position in its own company portfolio and that it recognizes a “key player risk” at Tesla. Especially with regard to a possible court-enforced takeover of Twitter, Musk Black fears that his numerous companies could run out of time.

Musk wants to continue to lead Tesla

Musk then made it clear to shareholders that he had no plans to relinquish leadership of Tesla anytime soon. “I intend to stay at Tesla for as long as I can prove myself useful, and I think the most useful area I can be in is product design and manufacturing, so basically factory design, product design and optimization of the manufacturing,” says the CEO.

Nevertheless, he has no doubts that Tesla can operate successfully without him. “We have a very talented team here, so I think Tesla would continue to do very well even if I was abducted by aliens or maybe I went back to my home planet,” Musk joked, drawing a lot of laughs from the audience. In the past he has joked that Mars is actually his home planet. “I’m definitely working as hard as I can and I’m really excited for the future of the company and I think it has a very good future even without me,” Musk continued. “I’m not going to clarify that.”

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