Tesla Appoints Vaibhav Taneja as New Chief Financial Officer
After a 13-year tenure at Tesla Inc., Zachary Kirkhorn, the Chief Financial Officer, has unexpectedly resigned. This unexpected change has sparked concerns about the future leadership of Elon Musk’s company.
Kirkhorn, one of only four named directors and the company’s prominent voice among shareholders, resigned on Aug. 4, the company said in a regulatory filing Monday. He will continue to serve in an unspecified capacity until the end of the year “to support a seamless transition.”
CFO Vaibhav Taneja took on the role of CFO in addition to his current duties, Tesla said. Taneja, 45, held various positions at the electric vehicle maker before becoming chief accounting officer in 2019. He previously worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers in India and the US.
Tesla shares turned negative due to the news during early trading. They were down 3.9% in New York at 11:24 a.m. The share price has doubled this year.
Kirkhorn’s departure comes as Tesla builds a new factory in Mexico and prepares to bring its Cybertruck pickup truck to market as it fends off rivals in an increasingly crowded electric car market. Tesla has lowered prices across its lineup to maintain its position at the top of the electric car industry.
“He’s had a 13-year tour at Elon, which is like 50 years for anybody else,” said Gene Munster, president of Deepwater Asset Management. “The fact that he will stay until the end of the year bodes well for the transition.”
Still, the departure of Kirkhorn, who was considered the best candidate to succeed Musk as CEO, renews uncertainty about Tesla’s leadership. It also immediately raises the profile of Taneja, who was not among the 16 executives invited to the stage with Musk at an investor meeting in March.
Kirkhorn joined Tesla in 2010 as a senior financial analyst and was promoted five times, most recently to CFO in early 2019 at the age of 34. Before he took over, Tesla had a long history of losses and at times burned through more than $1 billion in cash. quarterly. The company has been consistently profitable since then, paying back about $10 billion in debt over the past three years, helping it secure investment-grade ratings. It also joined the S&P 500 in December 2020.
A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, Kirkhorn worked as CFO under his predecessors Deepak Ahuja and Jason Wheeler. He spoke at length on Tesla’s quarterly earnings calls, and investors kept him well in check on costs. He regularly talked about how recurring software revenue would play a growing role in the future.
“Zach did a great job of increasing the margins,” said Munster. “Usually when companies increase their production, their margins are under pressure. He threaded the needle, and that’s a difficult thing.”
Kirkhorn owned 197,540 shares last month, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, a holding worth about $49 million. He recently sold about $1 million in shares.
“Being a part of this company is a special experience, and I’m very proud of the work we’ve done together,” Kirkhorn wrote Monday on LinkedIn. “I also want to thank Elon for his leadership and optimism that has inspired so many people.”
The executive added the title of “Master of Coin” in early 2021, about a month after Tesla revealed it had made a $1.5 billion investment in Bitcoin. The tongue-in-cheek title was given at the same time as Musk became “Tesla’s tech.”
A company filing Monday did not list “Master of Coin” as one of Taneja’s roles as new CFO.
