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In 2003, Martin Eberhard co-founded Tesla Motors with Marc Tarpenning, serving as the company's inaugural Chief Executive Officer.
Along with Tarpenning, Eberhard spearheaded Tesla's founding mission to build electric sports cars using lithium-ion battery cells.
He oversaw the initial design and development of the Tesla Roadster, the company's first production vehicle that aimed to prove electric cars could be high-performance.
During Eberhard's four-year tenure, Tesla raised venture funding, unveiled prototypes, and readied production of the Roadster to introduce it as the world's first serial production highway-capable all-electric car.
However, Eberhard was reportedly asked to step down as CEO in 2007 amidst rising tensions and disagreements with the board and Chairman Elon Musk regarding delays, cost overruns, and executive leadership changes.
Nevertheless, Eberhard is considered instrumental in transforming Tesla from an ambitious Silicon Valley startup into the first viable automotive company focused exclusively on electric powertrains, paving the way for its future growth and success.
In August 2007, amidst growing troubles surrounding Tesla's delay-plagued Roadster production and rising tensions between co-founder Martin Eberhard and Chairman Elon Musk, the company's board dismissed Eberhard as CEO.
In his place, the board installed Michael Marks, a technology industry veteran and private equity investor, as Tesla's interim Chief Executive Officer.
Marks was brought in on short notice to serve in a temporary management role for a transitional period expected to last just a few months.
As interim CEO, he focused his efforts on assessing the state of the Roadster's engineering and production hurdles, mediating the strained relationship between Eberhard and Musk, and recruiting a permanent CEO to lead the company going forward.
Marks' brief tenure steering Tesla allowed the board time to find a longer-term replacement and briefly sidelined the Eberhard-Musk confrontations as the company remained laser-focused on getting its debut vehicle across the finish line.
In 2007, Ze'ev Drori was brought in by Tesla's board of directors, led by Elon Musk, to replace Martin Eberhard as Chief Executive Officer and take on the additional role of President.
Drori was tasked with getting Tesla's delayed production of the Roadster electric sports car back on track after the company struggled under Eberhard's leadership.
An experienced executive, Drori focused Tesla more narrowly on meeting its goals to begin manufacturing the Roadster before the company's financial resources were exhausted.
This intense focus on execution came at the expense of Tesla's freewheeling engineering culture.
During his roughly 1-year tenure, Drori put Tesla on the path toward volume production, yet some criticize that it came at the expense of innovation.
With the Roadster nearing the start of production in 2008, Drori was soon replaced by Elon Musk as CEO, who sought to combine the company's innovative beginnings with disciplined execution.
Elon Musk has been the driving force behind Tesla since 2004, leading the company from its earliest days to its current status as the world’s most valuable automaker.
Musk joined Tesla’s founding team in 2004 as Chairman and lead investor, contributing over $70 million of initial funding.
Though not originally holding an executive position, Musk played a powerful role in shaping Tesla’s visionary product strategy focused exclusively on electric vehicles.
He assumed an increasingly hands-on product development and strategic leadership role in the company, and by 2008 had supplanted his co-founders as Tesla’s Chief Executive Officer.
Since then and across his over 15 years thus far at the helm, Musk has become the face of Tesla, guiding the company with his signature ambitious optimism, relentless work ethic and commitment to innovation.
He has led Tesla to pioneer multiple vehicle models pioneering the mainstream electric vehicle market, build an industry-leading charging network, and catalyze transformations across the global automotive landscape.
Despite turbulence, skepticism and missteps along the way, Musk’s relentless leadership has firmly established Tesla as the highest-valued automaker in history and a leader of sustainable transportation.
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