One of Tesla’s earliest investors, Ross Gerber, called for Elon Musk to step down as the company’s executive in an interview Tuesday, scathingly claiming that he’s “destroyed” its reputation.
“I think Tesla needs a new CEO and I decided today I was going to start saying it and so this is the first show that I’m saying it on,” Gerber told host Darren McCaffrey on Sky’s Business Live.
“It’s time for somebody to run Tesla,” he continued, noting that Musk is stretching himself too thin across his work at X and by President Donald Trump’s side. “There are too many important things Tesla is doing, so either Elon should come back to Tesla and be the CEO of Tesla and give up his other jobs, or he should focus on the government and keep doing what he is doing but find a suitable CEO of Tesla.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Gerber went on to say that Tesla was “absolutely” in crisis following Musk’s recent movements, listing out the company’s formidable achievements in the electric vehicle space and how the billionaire has since worked overtime to tarnish it.
“The company’s reputation has just been destroyed by Elon Musk,” Gerber argued. “Sales are plummeting, so yeah, it’s a crisis. You literally can’t sell the best product in the marketplace because the CEO is so divisive.”
The investor, who claims to have been involved with Tesla for over a decade, also disclosed that he has been selling his shares over the past year because “the way people view your brand is really, really crucial to part of the purchasing process that humans use.”
“We really identify with the cars we drive, especially in the United States, and so when your brand gets tarnished like this—it’s real bad,” he continued, adding that he really started to become “concerned” as an investor when Musk first bought Twitter in 2022 and didn’t know it “could go this far.”
According to a report from Business Insider published Tuesday, Tesla’s shares have now plummeted 53% from a record high reached in mid-December. The company’s market value has similarly steadily plunged since December as well.
The billionaire briefly addressed Tesla’s staggering plunge in an X post March 10 where he said the company “will be fine long-term,” though admitted in a Fox Business interview aired that same day that he was running his other businesses “with great difficulty.”
Musk has spent the past few months of Trump’s second presidency spearheading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) where he’s bulldozed through the federal government in an effort to downsize it.
