XHANGHAI, June 9 (Reuters) – Tesla was holding an online recruitment event in China on Thursday and added two dozen new job offers for the country, a week after Elon Musk threatened to cut jobs at the manufacturer of electric cars and would say the company was “over-staffed” in some areas.
Tesla (TSLA.O) plans to hold the event online from 7pm Shanghai time (1100 GMT) and will hire staff for “smart manufacturing” functions, according to an online post.
Tesla currently has 224 offers in China for managers and engineers in this category, according to a separate post on its WeChat account, 24 of which were recently posted on June 9th.
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Published positions include managers and engineers to oversee the operation of its 6,000-ton die casting machines known as Giga Press, one of the largest in the world.
Tesla regularly organizes such online recruitment events in China, and the last one was held in May for summer interns.
Tesla’s revenue in China more than doubled in 2021 from a year ago, contributing a quarter of the U.S. automaker’s total revenue.
The Shanghai plant, which manufactures Model 3 and Model Y for domestic sale and export, produced more than half of the cars it manufactured last year, and Tesla also plans to expand the factory. Read more
However, the plant’s production was severely affected by the two-month blockade of Shanghai’s COVID-19, which saw it halt work for 22 days and then struggled to return to full production. Prior to that, Tesla had planned to increase production at the plant to 22,000 cars a week by mid-May.
Musk, the chief executive, said in an email seen by Reuters last week that he had “a very bad feeling” about the economy and that he needed to cut 10% of the electric car maker’s workforce. The email was titled “Pause All Recruitments Worldwide.” Read more
In another email to employees on Friday, Musk said Tesla would reduce the number of salaried employees by 10%, as there has been “overstaffing in many areas,” but added that “it will increase the number of employees by hour “.
However, he moved away from emails on Saturday, saying that the total number of employees would increase over the next 12 months and that the number of salaried staff should change little. Read more
Musk had not specifically commented on the staff in China.
Last month, Musk compared American workers to those in China, saying that American workers used to avoid going to work, while Chinese workers would not leave factories.
“They will burn oil at 3 in the morning,” he told a Chinese workers’ conference.
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Report by Zhang Yan and Brenda Goh; Edited by Stephen Coates
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